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WASHINGTON: 

PRINTED BY JNO. T. 4 LEM. TOWERS. 
1857. 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWiN. 



Report of the Proceedings of the Celebration of the Two Hun- 
dred and Fiftieth Anniversary of the English Settlement 
at Jamestoion. 

The Jamestown Society of Washington City, an association con- 
sisting of Virginia gentlemen residing there, having determined to 
celebrate, at the site of Jamestown, the two hundred and fiftieth Anni- 
versary of tlie settlement, invited Ex-President TyljER to deliver an 
Oration, and Mr. James Barron Hope a Poem, on the occasion. The 
invitations were kindly accepted by those gentlemen. As the members 
of the Society resided two hundred and fifty miles from the site of 
Jamestown, and were strangers to its neighborhood, they could not and 
did not undertake to do more than charter a steamboat to convey 
themselves, and such as might join them at Washington and Alexandria, 
to the site of Jamestown, laud and explore the ground, return to their 
boat, and there, in view of the site, celebrate the Anniversary by the 
deliveiy of the Oration and Poem. Public statements to this effect 
■were made in answer to several communications from Virginia made 
to the Society after its purpose had become publicly known. At the 
same time it was stated that the Society would gladly co-operate in 
any arrangements which might be made in Virginia for havino- the 
celebration on the ground. In the execution of this purpose the Society 
chartered the steamer Powhatan. Th-ey also engaged music. It was 
not till within a few hours before the boat was to leave the wharf at 
Washington that it was ascertained that the engagement would not be 
fulfilled. Every eff"ort was made, but without success, to remedy the 
disappointment. The Secretary of War kindly gave the Society an 
order on the commanding officer of Fortress Monroe; but on present- 
ing the order, it was found that the music, which had been ordered 
thither from New York, had not yet arrived. 

About 6 o'clock, P. M., of Monday, May 11th, 1857, the steamer 
Powhatan, with a company consisting of members of the Society and 
others, left Washington and arrived at the site of Jamestown about 
9 o'clock on the morning of Wednesday, the 13th following. Several 
steamers, from Norfolk and Richmond, were in the river wkh banners 
flying, (fee. The company landed by means of a temporary wharf and 
scow, which the neighbors had provided, opposite to the fragments of 
the old church. Colonel William F. Phillips was appointed Marshal ; 
and under his guidance the company moved in procession, a distance 
of about two miles, to a part of the island on which the military were 
encamped, and where it was understood a rostrum had been erected. 



'Z CELEBKATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

Lt. Colonel Gary, of the First Regiment of Virginia Volunteers, the 
officer having charge of the military arrangements, received the Society 
with distinguished courtesy, and extended to them every facility in his 
power. About 12 o'clock Ex-President Tyler arrived at the landing 
in the steamer Glen Cove, from Richmond, escorted by Mr. Montague, 
Chairman of the Committee of the Society, appointed for that purpose, 
vpas received at the landing by the whole Committee, and by them 
attended to the rostrum. 

About one o'clock, P. M., Philip R. Fendall, Esq., President of the 
Jamestown Society of Washington City, addressed the meeting as 
follows : 

Fellow-Citizens : 

We have assembled to commemorate the two hundred and fiftietli 
Anniversary of the first permanent English settlement in North 
America. We are on the site of what once was Jamestown — pilgrims 
to the graves of our forefathers. Their heroism and constancy here 
planted the seeds of a mighty republic, now reaching from ocean to 
ocean, dispensing to millions the blessings of civil and religious liberty, 
and animating by its example the cause of human rights throughout 
the world. Auspicious to all mankind is the great event which we 
celebi'ate! Especially, deeply interesting is it to Virginia, whose soil 
was its scene ! On this day, and on this consecrated spot, you will 
hear from hei- gifted and honored son a fit recital of the most glorious 
theme in the annals of civilization. 

On an occasion so suggestive as the present of gratitude to the Al- 
Tnighty Ruler of the Universe, it is proper that our exercise should be 
begun with prayer. Allow me to introduce to you the Rev. Mr. Wil- 
MER, of Williamsburg, who will address the throne of grace. 

The Rev. George T. Wilmer, then advanced in front of the stand 
and pronounced the following prayer : 

Almighty God, Creator and Governor of all things visible and invisi- 
ble, we beseech Thee graciously to hear us who are now assembled in 
Thy name and presence. May Thy spirit preside over the celebration 
of this day — impress all who are present with a due sense of their 
obligations unto Thee. Thou hast wonderfully preserved and prosper- 
ed this people, when they were strangers in this land, but few in num- 
ber. Thou didst help them, and didst show, that the race was not to 
the swift, nor the battle to the strong. Now, that they have become a 
powerful nation, grant them magnanimity equal to the fortitude which 
they displayed in the days of their weakness. May we ever remember 
that our forefathers brought here their holy religion, with their politi- 
cal institutions, and planted the vine of the Lord by the side of the 
pillars of the State. These both have grown together, to remain, as 
we trust,, forever united. Teach us to worship and serve Thee, not 
only as the Lord of hosts, but also as the God of our eternal salvation ; 
which we ask in the name of our Saviour Jesus Christ; to whom, with 
Thee and the Holy (Jhost, be all honor and glory, world without end. 
Amen. 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 3 

Ex-Presideut Tyler was then introduced to the meeting, and pro- 
nounced the following Oration : 

Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Jamestown Society : 

I congratulate you on the success which has crowned your efforts. 
You have founded a society which I trust is destined to no early or 
premature decay. Virginia has been awakened by your summons, 
and her patriotic sons and daughters are here to greet you. It is fit- 
ting that it should be so. The memory of a glorious ancestry should 
be kept bright in the recollections of their posterity ; and their noble 
daring in the cause of civilization, and brave I'esolves in favor of free- 
dom, should be recounted from generation to generation. Your society 
is designed to be the connecting link between the past and that mighty 
future which is yet to be. If there ever were men worthy to be held 
in remembrance, they were those who settled this now flourishing 
country, and incorporated with its very soil the principles of human 
right — what wonderful results have arisen from that event which we 
have met here to celebrate? A small body of men planted on this 
spot the seed of a mighty empire. It sprung up, its growth at first 
sickly, and often near perishing, but finally it grew and flourished until 
at this day millions of the human family shelter under its branches, 
and its leaves are watered by the dews of two oceans. To me you 
have assigned the task of opening the records of the past, and of 
tracing the developments of this great adventure. I do no more than 
furnish brief sketches of the most prominent actois and acts which 
spread over centuries, and I shall do so without an effort to clothe them 
in a drapery which is either rhetoiical or artificial. 

The reign of Elizabeth had ended by her death in 1603, Her efforts 
to colonize America, under the lead of Sir Walter Raleigh, a name 
illustrious in history, had, after several adventures, disastrously failed, 
and the despondence consequent upon those failuies had rendered 
almost torpid upon the subject the great mind of England, Fifteen 
years had elapsed, and no effort had been made to rekindle the enthu- 
siasm which had charactei'ized the antecedent period, A single voice 
was at last heard addressing itself to the nobles and gentry, and urging 
the vast importance to England and the world, of colonizing the country, 
which the Virgin Queen had called Virginia, and which "embraced all 
the region lying between the 34th and 45th degrees of N, latitude with 
its unlimited and undefined western boundary. It was the voice of 
Bartholomew Gosnold, Some attention was given to his representations 
and urgent solicitations, yet the prospect of success was gloomy and 
rayless, until one, the report of whose heroic daring and bold adventures 
in other lands had preceded him, made his appeaiance in London and 
united with Gosnold in urging the enterprise. That man was John 
Smith, Gosnold had visited the coast of Virginia n)ore than once, and 
he doubtless failed not to speak of its beautiful scenery, its magnificent 
forests, and its fertile soil — Smith united in his person and "bearino-, 
grace, and refinement and policy and forethought, with a courage which 
no danger could appal, and a resolution which no difficulties eould sub- 
due. His broad experience in the active affaiis of the world, and his 



4: CELEBEATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

extraordinary faculty of extricating himself from situations of extreme peril, 
together with the romantic turn manifested by him from an early period 
of life, gave to his representations more than ordinary force, and designated 
him as one whose connexion with such an adventure, was of incalculable 
value; others soon united with Gosnold and Smith in urging the enterprise, 
and resorted to every legitimate argument to forward it. The devout and 
pious Christian was told that a new and more expanded theatre than had 
before presented itself, was opened to missionary labors. Before the capital- 
ist, desirous of making a profitable investment of surplus capital, was spread 
out temptingly, the profits that would ultimately most surely arise from the 
investment — and to the patriot was represented the glory of extending the 
English name and language and dominion over regions of almost boundless ex- 
tent. These arguments had the desired effect. A company was soon organized, 
at the head of which was placed Sir Thomas Smith, one of the able councillors 
of Elizabeth's time, and a charter duly granted by King James I., and on the 
19th of December, 16U6, two ships, the one of 100 tons, and the other of 40, and a 
pinnace of 20 tons, witli their living freight, accompanied by the tears of some 
and the cheers of others, set sail from Blackwall for this terra incognita. And 
now they are afloat upon the wild waves of the Atlantic, those small ships and 
that little pinnace, surpassed in tonnage by the vessels thathoiu'ly pass and re- 
pass this spot upon some coasting voyage, or in the traffic of the bay and rivers — 
the adventurers in all, one hundred men — measured by the magnitude of the- 
enterprise, and its dangers, how contemptible, small and inadequate do these 
means to meet it appear to have been. The hazards of the sea — a country of 
vast extent, inhabited by warlike tribes of a different race — a wilderness in 
•which no ray of civilization was to be found — a now world to be reclaimed from 
its long night of barbarism and deep gloom, and that little fleet and those hun- 
dred men were to be the pioneers of such an enterprise! As if to mark "the 
madness of the hour," theie was at work amid a small number of those adven- 
turers, a spirit of malevolence and ill-will directed against the man, who, if 
human agency could accomplish it, was ultimately to save them from starva- 
tion and death. What a commentary on the infirmity of poor human nature 
is exhibited in this fact. But good Master limit was with them to admonish 
and reprove, and there went forth at the rising and setting of the sun, over the 
wide waste of waters, the voice of prayer, lulling into repose the spirit of un- 
wise contention and ascending to the throne of the Creator. Tiiose pi'ayers 
were heard, and when the little pinnace of 20 tons, "the captain being ignorant 
of the coast, and the mariners having lost their reckoning by three days," was 
in the act of abandoning the voyage and returning to Ei]gland, a tempest 
anatched her from the hands of captain and crew, and drove her upon her 
destined way within the capes, — and thus on this day two hundred and fifty 
years ago, those tempest-tost vessels swung quietl\' on their anchors in yonder 
stream, and that body of adventurers landed on this beach and prepared to 
make it the place of their abode. 

The log cabin is built, its covering of reeds, and the fortification, made of 
logs and brush to guard against surprise from a savage foe, is hastily construct- 
ed. Now, after the lapse of centuries, we, their descendants and successors, 
come here to revisit their graves, and to tread the soil which is Juillowed by 
their sufferings, and was olten watered by their tears. What though all be 
now changed — what though in place of tlie unhioken forest, boundless fields 
covered with luxuriant crojis everywhere abound? What though the fort and 
hastily constructed breast-work, and the red man to restrain whose assaults 
they were erected, have long since passed away? What though no trace of 
the city, reared by the hands of that "noble army of martyrs" in the cause of 
civilization, remains, save yon broken steeple, and that small brick house be- 
yond, which hiis been preserved by successive propiietors for plantation pur- 
poses, but whose vaults constituted the powder magazine of other days, and the 
prison house of Opechancanough, that most subtle chieftain of the Indian tribe? 
What though what was then a Peninsula is now changed into an Island by a 
stream, which as late as fifty years ago, was so narrow as to have presented no 
impediment in the way of free access to the laud, but which is now broad and 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 5 

deep enoiigh to float either of the vessels that brought over the first emigrants ; 
and what though tiie waters now cover a large portion of what in earty days 
was firm land, on which numerous habitations stood ? What if the inscriptions 
on the monuments erected over the dead be rendered illegible by time, and the 
monuments themselves be in fragments; yet is there a glory encircling those 
ruins, and arising from the earth, on which those adventurers trod, which decay 
cannot reach, and which the lapse of centuries can only make more imposing. 
We are here to do them reverence, and in the silent homage of the heart to 
utter thanksgiving and praise to our Heavenly Parent for the great benefits 
which, under his good providence, their hardy and successful adventures have 
conferred upon us and upon the world. 

I need not dwell upon the hazards encountered by the early settlers, or the 
narrow escapes of the colony from entire destruction The red and white man 
stood face to face, and the last was regarded by the first as a daring intruder 
and a deadly enemy. The contest between them was a contest of life and 
death. Unlike the Indians of Peru, who approached the Spaniards with awe 
and reverence as superior beings, the Indians here looked upon the settlers 
with aversion, and made war upon them without loss of time. But a still more 
formidable enemy clung around and about them, and preyed upon their flesh 
and consumed the marrow of their bones. Hunger, gaunt and horrible, wasted 
them away, and brought on disease and death. Inone year from the time of 
their landing, tlieir numbers were reduced from 100 to 38, and they too would 
have perished but for timely supplies of corn, which Smith had procured by 
prosecuting a traffic full of danger with the Indians. Among those who per- 
ished was Bartholomew Gosnold, the originator of the expedition. We may 
be permitted to regret that he did not live long enough to see even the first 
glimmering of success in that adventure he had been the earliest to advocate. 
The fertile earth remained uncultivated except by the few, while the many 
passed their lives in idleness, and contributing nothing to the public stores, 
looked thither only for their daily bread. The charter which had been granted 
by King James to the company, required that the product of the united labor 
of the emigrants, should be brought into the public stores, and that each and 
all should draw their supplies from thence. For nearly five years was this 
provision enforced, and during that time, with the exception of the short pe- 
riod of Smith's administration, nought but evil ensued. It is difficult to con- 
ceive a state of things more propitious to the theory of Communism or Social- 
ism, and yet the failure was most signal and awful. A jM-oJuctive soil invited 
cultivation, while rapidly diminishing stores admonished to industry and labor, 
and yet the large majority listlessly folded their arms in idleness and followed 
the example of the sluggard. In this they were encouraged by the censurable 
course of those who were in office over them. They kept the control over the 
supplies, and feasted sumptuously, while others had doled out to them a pint 
of damaged wheat or barley. As if to aggravate their sufferings, a fire con- 
sumed their dwellings in the depth of a severe winter, and left them exposed 
to the life-chilling blast. Smith's fortunate return from an exploring expedi- 
tion, bringing supplies of corn, saved the poor remnant of the first settlers from 
pei'ishing. How extraordinaiy and almost miraculous is often the influence 
exerted by one man over the conduct of others; all that was indolent in the 
natures of the colonists seemed to pass away upon his return — every one went 
steadily to work to repair the damages occasioned by the fire, and the town 
soon arose from its ashes. The church was substantially rebuilt, and better 
houses took the place of those destroyed. He had been denied his place in the 
council by the wretched men who had borne sway, but the spirit of the many 
was in open revolt — the bad rulers were expelled by the popular voice, and 
Smith installed in the Presidency ; and this was the first instance of popular re- 
volt against tyrannical misrule, which occured in our annals. While the presi- 
dency was filled by Smith, to use the language of the historian, " peace was 
firmly established with all the people of Powhatan," the consequence of which 
was the introduction of plenty, and the removal of discontent; works of public 
utility progressed with rapidity, whilst the interior economy of the establish- 
ment was regulated by a spirit of discipline and integrity which promised the 



6 CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

most beneficial consequences. How rapidly was this condition of things al- 
tered upon his retiring from the presidency and returing to England ; all fell 
again into disorder, and in a short time the numbers of the settlers which had 
been augmented to 500, were reduced to 60, and they half starved and misera- 
ble. 

I need not remind you that these wretched survivors resolved to abandon the 
coiintry, and under the command of Sir Thomas Gates and Sir George Somers, 
who had been wrecked on "the Bermudas" in the Sea Venture, which incident 
gave birth to Shakespeare's play of the Tempest, they bade, as tliey supposed, 
a final adieu to Virginia, where they had buried so many of their comrades, 
and wliere they themselves had experienced so much of suft'ering. But it was 
ordained by the higher power that this should not be. Every sail was set, and 
every heart was tilled with joy at what was considered an escape from death, 
when Lord Delaware, witli well appointed ships, more than three hundred emi- 
grants, and abundant supplies, met them in the river, off Mulberry Island, and 
induced their return to Jamestown. 

It deserves to be mentioned that Lord Delaware was the first who bore the 
title of Governor. He assumed a style of display but little suited to the condi- 
tion of the colony. In a town whose buildings were covered with clap-boards 
and Indian mats, he maintained a state which would not have disgraced the 
sovereigns of England. Yet his rule was wise, energetic, and beneficial. 

A morning of more promise was now to dawn upon the colony — a new chai"- 
ter had been granted by the King, and under Sir Thomas Dale, lands were as- 
signed to each person who chose to cultivate them, and their profits inured to 
the industrious cultivator for his inclusive benefit under easy stipulations and 
conditions. William Spencer and Thomas Barrett, two of the original settlers, 
whose names are familiar to the inhabitants of this country at this day, were 
the first who went foi-tli to cultivate the lands, and were speedily followed by 
others, and frcun that nioinent we hear no more of "the starving times," as the 
year succeeding Smith's de[)arture iVir England had been universally termed. 
A profound peace prevailed with the aborigines who, for moderate wages, ren- 
dered the settler aid in clearing and cultivating his land. From this period the 
permanent existence of the colony may be dated. The dreams in which some 
had so freely indulged, of the precious metals, gave way to the safe and rational 
conclusion that substantial independence was to be acquired more readily by 
cultivating the land than by indulging in Utopian visions of mines of gold or 
mountains of precious stones. And now the woodman's axe awakened echoes 
in the dense forest, which had slumbered since the great flood. The humble, 
but comfortable dwelling-house, which was destined to become the seat of un- 
bounded hospitality, arose on the shores of the rivers, and in the bosom of the 
wilderness new plantations and hundreds were established. Large donations 
were made of lands for the endowment of a college, proposed to be located at 
a new town called Henrico ; and considerable gifts of money for the education 
and civilization of the savages were freely made ; and emigration was invited 
by voluntary donations of fifty-acre freeholds to all who would settle and cul- 
tivate them. The effect of this wise regulation, together with the facility of 
acquiring larger tracts of land for modej-ate prices, soon made itself apparent 
in large additions to the population. In 1616, when Governor Dale returned 
to England, the population was less than 400. Six years afterwards it had iu- 
ereased to more than 4,000. One thousand arrived shortly after his return, 
bringing with them an abundant supply of provisions and all other necessaries. 
It is true that no slight drawback to these important changes, in the policy of 
the company, existed in the substitution of martial law in place of those noble 
heritages which had been secured to every Englishman by the charter at Run- 
nemede — but during the excellent administration of Governor Dale, the arbi- 
trary code was rarely ever enforced. Unhappily he was succeeded by Captain 
Argall, who had rendered considerable service by expelling the French from the 
Territory of Maine, which fell within the chartered limits of Virginia, and had 
caused the Dutch, who had settled at New York, to acknowledge the authority 
of the Virginia Company. His rule over the colony was tyrannical, and the 
authority, which was almost harmless in the hands of Governor Dale, became 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. I 

an engine of despotism in his. He had, however, to deal with a people who 
could be letter governed by leniency than by force ; and a representation made 
to the conpany in London not only led to his recall, but to tlie recognition of 
the rights of the inhabitants as free-born Englishmen ; and among others, then- 
right to participate in the management of their own affairs. And now, on the 
30th July, 1619, for the first time that such a thing had occurred on the Ameri- 
can Continjnt, under a call from Governor Yeardley, there came up to James- 
town, from every town, hundred, and plantation, representatives of the people, 
elected by their free suffrages, to deliberate in a grand assembly with the Gov- 
ernor and council upon the affairs of the colony, and to assume those high func- 
tions and exercise those important rights of self-government, which, through 
all time tha-eafter their successors asserted and maintained. We may well im- 
agine the proud emotions which swelled the bosoms of all at this important 
event ; more especially may we conceive the intensity of delight with which 
an old settla- observed each Burgess as he alighted at the door of the City Ho- 
tel to obtain accommodation for the night 

When the morning of the day on which the General Assembly was to meet 
arrived, and the tioo bells from yon old steeple summoned the inhabitants of 
Jamestown to prayer, how devoutly each and all returned their thanks to the 
supreme Pailer of the Universe, for the signal mercies he had manifested to them 
through all their trials. There was his Excellency the Governor, with his 
household, ia the pew which Lord Delaware had caused to be neatly fitted up 
for himself and his successor. In another sat the honorable members of the 
privy council of State for the colony of Virginia, while the Burgesses were 
seen in the several pews witli their old acquaintances of the city. The church, 
and all its interior workmanship, was built of cedar. Good Master Hunt no 
longer lived, but his place was worthily supplied, and the vaulted roof echoed 
with anthems of praise and thanksgiving. A people in miniature had, in twelve 
years, sprung into existence, and their representatives had come from planta- 
tions, some as distant as an hundred miles, to assist in deliberations affecting the 
public good. With what pleasure should I unfold to your view the journals of 
that assembly if they were within my reach; but they are not on this side of 
the Atlantic. I have been informed by an esteemed friend* that they have 
been seen in the State paper office at London, where doubtless they now are. 
From the same source I learn that the ancestor of Thomas Jefferson was a mem- 
ber of that firsl assembly, as his illustrious descendant was of the last, a century 
and a half later, which sat under foreign sway. 

An accession of vast importance to the colony was soon after made. With- 
out the smiles of woman, the wilderness would become more wild — the thorns 
and brambles of life more keen and piercing. With her, as man's companion, 
those thorns bear roses; those brambles are often turned into blessings. Some 
time before Ann Burruss had led Mr. Layden captive, and that lovely forest 
maiden, Pocahontas, the personification of romance, had stood before the hyme- 
neal altar with Mr. John ilolfe; many of the wealthiest inhabitants had brought 
over their families; but still there was left a large number of bachelors, about 
whose homes no pleasant sound of woman's voice was heard. Sir Edwin San- 
dys, who had succeeded Sir Thomas Smith as Treasurer of the company, pro- 
vided passage for 1,261 new emigrants, "among whom were ninety agreeable 
young women," poor, but respectable, who became wives to the planters, and 
gave permanence and strength to the colony. 

The year 1619 witnessed also two other events of no slight importance to the 
country and to the human race. The first was the settlement of Plymouth, in 
wliat was called by the original charter North Virginia, of emigrants under au- 
thority of the Virginia company, which settlement, at an after day, was des- 
tined to play a conspicuous part in the great drama of politics, and whose pre- 
sent and future course is so intimately interwoven with the destiny of the 
proudest republic that the world has ever known, which its bravery and wis- 
dom so greatly aided to establish— the second, the landing at this place of 
twenty negroes from Africa, from Dutch vessels. In the course of time the 



* Hugh B. Grigsby, Esq. 



8 CELEBKATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

sliipping interests of Old England and New England entered actively into the 
trade, and all the then colonies became African slave marts. It was ascertained, 
however, after full experience, that the labor of the black man couLl only be 
profitably employed in a warm climate, and in a strictly speaking agricultural 
country. Hence the owners and proprietors of the colder, transfeired to the 
warmer climate, a large majority of that class of laborers, and added vastly to 
their number by direct importations from Africa. Having by an esport from 
their own soil, the process of more than a century, diminished the nnmber still 
left among them to a comparative handfuU, they issued, after the power apper- 
tained to them as States, edicts of emancipation, not, in most instances, in favor 
of slaves then in existence, but of an unborn offspring. Man every where is 
the creature of self-interest. That is the great prompter to action, and is the 
principle which originates activity and enterprise. It is tliat which carries the 
whale ship around the icebergs of the frozen ocean, and belts the world with a 
mercantile marine. Looking to the subject therefore as an isolated fact, I am 
far from complaining of the Northern States for having carried out that prin- 
ciple in regard either to the foreign or domestic slave trade. Thej' sold, and 
our ancestors bought, and neither seller or buyer has just cause of complaint. 
Let the vendor and his descendants, however, consult at all times the priciples 
of true honesty and of fair dealing. If the English or Northern merchant has 
sold to the Vii'ginia merchant damaged goods at the price of sound, and at the 
time of sale represented them to be sound, let him not, because liis own stock 
has become exhausted, proclaim the iniquity to the world, but rather for the 
sake of his own fair fame, hold his peace. This is due as well to the purchaser 
as to himself. The only amends he can make is to take back his damaged 
goods, and pay to the purchaser his purchase money with interest from the 
day of sale. In this way only can he strike a fair balance sheet. Nor will it 
do to urge that this would require more money than half the world contains. 
This is no answer. If the vendor cannot afford the payment, the purchaser 
cannot afford the loss. If one cannot do what is right, he should at least be 
silent. I know that these suggestions will have no influence over the conduct 
of England. She has her game to play, and she plays it in violation of all the 
comity which should exist among nations. Our colonial liistory is full of evi- 
dences of her disposition to deny to us the privilege of self-government. But 
it cannot be so with our sisters of this Union. Unless they will consent to be- 
come the mere organs of British opinion, and blot out all that is precious in 
their history, they will assert as well for their confederates as themselves the 
I'ight of each State to regulate its domestic affairs according to its own views 
of policy and propriety, without interference from any quarter whatever. Vir- 
ginia never had a mercantile marine of much moment, and it may well be 
doubted whether a Virginia ship ever did visit the coast of Africa for purposes 
of the slave ti-ade. Our forefathers bought from those who had, and bought 
under perpetual protests through their general assemblies. Thus, imder the 
decrees of all-wise Providence the domestic institutions of Virginia were made 
patriarchal in their character. And it deserves to be well considered by our 
sister States, whether they are not quite as much interested in preserving the 
existing condition of things as we ourselves. I go no farther.^ To do so would 
be to depart from the line marked out by the occasion which has brought us 
together. 

We have hurriedly passed over twelve years of history. We have seen the 
colony struggling for existence, and saved from perishing by occurrences which 
bear the impress of Providential interposition. At one moment we have seen 
the settlers wasted by famine and disease from one hundred to thirty-eight; at 
another, from five hundred to sixty; and that small remnant afloat upon the 
waters, with all canvas spread, to leave forever a country which had been so 
fruitful of suffering and distress— and how providentially they were arrested 
by the arrival of a fleet with new emigrants and abundant supplies. We have 
seen communism give place to separate proprietorship, and from that moment 
we have noted the happy change in the condition of things — the settlement of 
numerous farms and plantations, and great accessions, by emigration, to the 
number of the settlers. The General Assembly has also, for the first time, been 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 



convened, and an organized giovernraent put into operation.^ Tobacco had al- 
ready become the staple of Virginia, and constituted the basis ot domestic trat- 
fic and commercial exchange. Notwithstanding the efforts made in England 
to discontinue its culture, James I. having employed his_ own pen to write it 
down its culture was extended and the demand for it rapidly increased. It was 
hoped that the raising of silk would be found to supersede it, and accordingly 
every inducement was held out for its production. For a season many planters 
adopted it— one is said to have planted and had growing seventy thousand niul- 
berry trees and Kino- Charles 1. afterwards appeared at court dressed in a tull 
suit of Virginia silk. But bounties, nor threats, nor rewards, could sustain it 
in its competition with a weed, the use of which was becoming daily more ex- 
tensively in demand in the markets of the world. Tobacco through foreign 
exchanges lay at the foundation of most of the comforts, and all the luxuries 
of the inhabitants; and when, as was the case shortly afterwards, houses ot 
inspection were established, the certificates f deposit at those houses, cal ed 
tobacco-notes, became the standard of value, and the circulating medium ot the 
country— a greatly better one than we have often seen in our day. it would 
seem s^ometimes, as if its production had been regulated by the samepriiieiples, 
and for the same purposes, which govern in the case of the banking institutions 
of the present day. Whenever the quantity of tobacco grown became exces- 
sive the ensuing year witnessed a curtailment of the production ; and some- 
times, when the^aVticle had depreciated very much in value, so as to jeaye^in 
fact no profit, the culture for the ensuing year was entirely prohibited, thus 
the law of supply and demand, which more or less enters into all the tratiic ot 
life was consulted with more than ordinary care in the article of tobacco. _ i 
cannot avoid mentioning in this connection, that Smollett, in his continuation 
of Hume, declares tobacco to have been the chief foundation m Lurope, ot the 
public credit of these States in their revolutionary contest. Jamestown had 
become a place of note, and ships from many countries came hither to obtain 
their supplies of tobacco and other articles, bringing in exchange foreign pro- 
ductions. Many of the inhabitants had been educated at Oxford or Cambridge, 
and claimed descent and close affiance with the oldest Peers of England. One 
is almost surprised, in looking over the list of emigrants, to find that up to 
1620, there were among the number thirty-four noblemen, of the highest and 
most ancient families of the English Peerage, and one hundred and twenty-eight 
Knights Baronet and three Ladies, distinguished in their day for their elegance 
and accomplishments— Mary, Countess of Shrewsbury ; Lady Grey, and the 
Lady Conway. When to this is superadded the fact that very many ot tlie 
other emigrants were persons of wealth, cultivation and refinement, and fami- 
liar with science in all her departments, it is not going too far to say that the 
society of Jamestown, at that early day, might enter into a legitimate compari- 
son with that of our more populous cities of the present. Philosophy wove 
her wreath of oak, and the brow of poetry was encircled by its wreath ot 
laurel. At a period somewhat later, this was manifested in the publication ot 
a translation, by George Sandys, who was Treasurer of the Colony, of Grids 
Metamorphoses and a part of !^neid, whom Dryden pronounced the best versi- 
fier of the age, and Pope, in his notes to the Iliad, declared that English poetry 
owed much of its beauty to his translations. lie has left, also, a collection of 
Psalms, which the poet Montgomery has more recently pronounced the most poet- 
ical in the English language. I cannot avoid repeating his dedication of his work 
to Charles I. : "I had hoped," he says, "to present His Majesty with a neb and 
well-peopled kingdom ; out as things have turned out, I have been only able to 
bring from thence myself and this composition, which needeth more than a 
singfe denization. For it is doubly a stranger, being sprung from an ancient 
Roman stock, and bred up in the New World, of the rudeness of which it could 
but participate, especially as it was produced amid wars and tumults instead of 
under the kindly and peaceful influence of the muses." I know of the existence 
of but one copy of this work in this country, and that is in the valuable library 
of a private and highly intellectual citizens of Norfolk.* 



* Hugh B. Grigsby, Esq. 



10 CELEBKATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

One of the controlling reasons which had led many to unite in the formation 
of the London Company, was the generous and praiseworthy object, to spread 
the trutlis of the Christian religion over benighted regions through the con- 
version of the aborigines of America. For this purpose a Professorship had been 
established in the College founded at Henrico, and large contributions had been 
made towards its endowment by the company and V)y individuals. Many Indian 
children attended for the purpose of instruction ; and the inhabitants on their 
farms united in their efforts by offices of kindness to the Indians, who were 
admitted freely to companionship in their liouses, to turn them from their idols; 
but neither the lectures of the learned Professors, or the admonitions of the 
planters, had any other than a partial effect. Their idol Ogee was still the ob- 
ject of their worsliip, and the burial-places of their tribes ttieir only temples — 
and such has been the character of that strange and doomed race to the present 
day. Occasionally and rarely was any convert made. Pocahontas was a 
christian in feeling and conduct before tlie Bible had been opened to her, and 
she therefore found in its teachings a congeniality with her mind and heart, and 
readily iiid)ibed them. Such, too, I doubt not, was the nature of Chaneo, a 
convert, who resided with Richard Pace. To that single convert is to be as- 
cribed the salvation of the colony from utter annihilation in 162'2 — and the 
benefit thus rcTidered by him to the cause of Christianity and civilization was 
beyond all price. I need not recount the incidents which preceded the terrible 
22d of March of that year The colonists reposed in a state of fancied but pro- 
found security. Peace had existed for some time, and the savages were admitted 
freely into their dwellings. Powhatan had died four years before, and had 
been succeeded in actual power by Opechancanough. tie saw the country of 
his fathers overrun and settled by the white race, and resolved upon their 
destruction. Never was duplicity more perfect, or stratagem more profound, 
than that resorted to by this wily chief. For two years he was engaged in 
arranging and sj^stematizing his plans. No man ever evinced in higher degree 
the power of combination. He had to bring into his views seventy different 
tribes, and to order the movement of each, that the blow should be struck every 
where, not only on the same day, but at tlie same hour — and yet all was silent 
as the grave, and no word or act betrayed the dark secret. It was after night- 
fall of the 21st of March, at an hour too late to save all, that Chaneo, who had 
been ordered to kill Pace, his benefactor, and whose hand revolted from the 
deed, communicated to Pace the horrible conspiracy. Filled with alarm, and 
terrified at the startling disclosure. Pace hastened to Jamestown, which he 
reached in time to save, and to enable the authorities to put on their guard 
many of the settlements and plantations — and so the missionary had his labors 
rewarded in the security from destruction of two thousand five hundred Chris- 
tian people. How inscrutable are the ways of Providence, and yet how full of 
beauty and wisdom ! 

The contest between privilege and prerogative, had its commencement in the 
reign of (iueen Elizabeth; she had most unwisely granted monopolies in every 
branch of industry. The consequence was a greatly augmented price for all the 
necessaries of life. The 8]>irit of determined resistance blazed out on the part 
of the people, and was reflected by Parliament. That sagacious Queen, how- 
ever, came readily to the conclusion that the only way to quiet the discontent, 
was by acquiesence in the wishes of her subjects; and, in her speech to Par- 
liament, she thanked them for the care of the public interest, and gave her 
approval to what they had done. Her popularity was greatly increased by 
this course, and her reign terminated amid the regrets of all. But she was 
succeeded by James I., who was a bigoted believer in the divine right of kings, 
and who stretched his prerogative to its greatest tension. A pedagogue and a 
tyrant, he was the opposite in all things to his illustrious predecessor. With- 
out the possession of a single statesman-like trait, ho fancied himself competent 
to regulate the afi'avrs of the Colony. The Comi^any resisted his efforts at in- 
terference with a proper spirit, and resolved to build up in Virginia a fabric of 
government restitig on the basis of popular rights. Tiiey, therefore, proceeded 
to draw up for Virginia a frame of government, which, considering that the 
doctrines of popular sovereignty were then in their infancy, may be regarded 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 11 

as having no parallel in the previous history of the world. I can only glance 
at it. A General Assenably was directed to be annually holdeii, based on the 
principle of free suffrage ; which, with the Governor and Council, shfiuld have 
united sway over the affairs of the Colony; every thing to be decided by a 
maiority vote. The trial by jury was ordained and established, and other pro- 
visions incorporated of much importance.* The very excesses into which James 
and his successor ran, and the bitter contests in wliich they were perpetually 
engaged with their Parliaments and people, caused a rapid growth of free prin- 
ciples in England ; which, finding a reflex in the London Company, caused to 
flow into the colony au increased stream of emigration, bearing upon its waves 
the same principles, which found a congenial home in the untamed wilderness. 
This was fully manifested in the enactments and resolutions of the_ General 
Assembly, which met at Jamestown in lij'it. A brief review of the incidents 
which preceded the call of that assembly, may not prove uninteresting. 

A contest had sprung up between the king and the company in London, in 
which at first the king manifested a mild and forbearing spirit, seeking thereby 
to accomplish his object, which was, a surrender of the charter. But the com- 
pany pursued its own course irres]iective of the wish as of the sovereign. The 
king, therefore, asked an unconditional surrender of the charter, which being 
indignantly refused, he resolved upon its abrogation, and ordered his Attorney 
General to adopt the proceeding by y?w warranto iov that purpose; audit 
suffices to say, that he found fit instruments for the exercise of his tyranny in 
a tame and servile court, who, against justice, and in the absence of all accredi- 
ted precedent, rendered a decree in accordance with his deteimination. While 
those things were transpiring in London the public mind of Virginia had become 
exceedingly agitated. The colonists apprehended from the ar\)itrary character 
of the sovereign, the investiture of his vicegerent here with unlimited power 
and despotic sway. Under these circumstances. Sir Francis Wyatt, who had 
conducted himself admirably in his high office of Governor, under thecomi)any'8 
appointment, convoked the General Assembly, which meeting, in March, 1624, 
has rendered itself forever memorable by tlic character of its proceedings. It 
boldly asserted principles Avhich sixty-four years afterwards paved the way to 
the overthrow of the Stuart dynasty, and in less than a century later, dissevered 
the connexion between this country and England. It is fitting that on this day, 
when we are here to commemorate the deeds of a glorious ancestry, we should 
read from the journals of that Assembly, their high resolves, and hcdd them up 
for the admiration of the world. Remember that Virginia contained at that 
time but a few thousand inhabitants, and yet she dared proclaim to the parent 
country and its monarch that, no matter how the dispute between the king and 
the company might eventuate, "the Governor shall not lay any taxes or 
impositions upon the colony, their lands or commodities, otherwise than by 
authority of the General Assendjly, to be levied and employed as the said 
Assembly may ajtpoint;" and "that he should not withdraw the inhabitants 
from their private labors to any service of his own, under any color whatever." 
It was for a violation of these great princijdes, thatCiiarles I. lost his head, and 
that James IL forfeited his kingdom. It was for their violation that George III. 
lost from his crown, studded as it was with precious gems, the most brilliant of 
them all. These proceedings which, in the language of Hume, asserted for each 
man "a fundamental property in his goods, and a fundamental liberty in his 
person," constitute the princij)les of what is called the Petition of Right, and 
were adopted four years in advance of that great measure by the British Par- 
liament. To show the value placed upon the proceeding when adopted by the 
Parliament, I read from Macaulay's history a few sentences : 

"The king ratified in the most solemn manner that celebrated law which is 
known as the Petition of Right, and which is the second great charter of the 
liberties of England." " The day on which the royal sanction after many delays 
was solemnly given to this great Act, was a day of joy and hope. The Commons 

* From this has been derived the forms of government which have been adopted by each of 
the States composing this Union ; the Senate being substituted for the Council, and formed into 
a separate house ; and the Governor being at the head of the Executive, which is formed into 
a department of itself. 



12 CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

•who crowded the bar of the House of Lords, broke forth into lond acclamations 
as soon as the clerk had pronounced the ancient form of words, by which our 
princes have, through manj- ages, signified their assent to the wishes of the 
estates of the realm. Those acclamations were re-echoed by the voice of the 
capital, and of the nation." 

And yet, four years before, this colony had adopted, in substance, the same 
Petition of Eight, and the tidings of what it had done were speedily wafted 
over the broad water to England. This is enough of itself to hallow this spot, 
and to account for this large assemblage. The house in which that General Assem- 
bly held its session, and from which went forth these edicts in favor of the rights of 
man, has long since ceased to exist. We may even tread on the dust of its 
rafters; but history has recorded on her indestructible tablets those brave re- 
solves, and we have received them as our birthright. "To lose them, or to give 
them away, were such perdition as nothing else could match." 

The same principles, in nearly the same words, were re-enacted in 1631, 
during the Governorship of Sir J. Hervey, who, for a time, nearly engrossed 
all power to himself, leaving to the Council and General Assembly, but the 
mere shadow of authoi'ity. The Assembly had forborne an active interference, 
until forbearance had ceased to be a virtue ; but in March, 1631, their resolution 
was taken to abide any issue, sooner than permit their privileges to be taken 
from them. The royal Governor yielded to the outburst of popular feeling, 
and endorsed, by his approval of the resolutions of the Assembly, the opposi- 
tion which his tyranny had evoked. But the tyrannical Pro-consul only com- 
promised for a moment. Following the example of Charles I. in regard to the 
Petition of Right, he sought only to readjust himself in his seat, and await the 
passing away of the storm, iu order to reasseit his former authoritj'; but in 
this, like his royal master, he courted his own fate. He was not only resisted, 
but finally evicted from the Governorship, and sent, in the custody of two 
members of the Assembly, to England. Thus was a revolution effected without 
bloodshed, or any serious disturbance. At that early day, a wholesome lesson 
was taught to public agents; and the colony might well have blazoned forth 
the proud motto of Virginia of this day, of " sic semper tyrannis." Charles I. 
might have deduced from the fate of his vicegerent at Jamestown, the bloody 
atonement which he made in his own person a few years later. But instead of 
profiting by the example, he restored Hervey to the Governorship, and treated 
the Delegates with contumely. Fortunately, however, matters had taken such 
a course in England as to induce him to displace Hervey, and to send out, as 
his deputy, in 1642, Sir William Berkeley,, whose name has become identified 
with the most important epoch in our history save that of the revolution. 

Thus have we hurriedly traced the motives which actuated the colonists, from 
their first settlement, to 1642. We hav^e seen them always prompt and decided in 
the assertion of their privileges, and claiming, at all times, the indefeasible 
right of laying and imposing taxes through their Grand Assemblies. The in- 
habitants may, therefore, be justly said to have been reared under the influence 
of the London company, in a knowledge of free principles. In their assertion 
they were always in advance of the parent country ; and if at any time they 
have seemed to slumber over them, it was but the slumber of the infant Her- 
cules, to be followed by a vigorous grasp of the tyranny which had coiled 
itself around them. Their determination to maintain their rights and privi- 
leges became more manifest in their subsequent history, and was, in no in- 
stance, more conspicuously exhibited than on the arrival of Cromwell's Com- 
missioners in 1651. The resolution seems to have been adopted to make the 
change in the government of England the occasion for a full and complete re- 
cognition of their rights. To this, may reasonably be attributed the delay in 
recognizing the Commonwealth; and hence their co-operation in the defence of 
Jamestown against the fleet and forces of the Protector. These were busy, 
and stirring, and anxious times in the good city of Jamestown. In one direc- 
tion were deliberating the members of the House of Burgesses, in another the 
Council, and in some contiguous palace was the Governor — each engaged in 
profound reflection on the condition of public affairs. On the waters of that 
river floated a formidable fleet, with a considerable body of land forces, to ex- 



CELEBEATION AT JAMESTOWN. 13 

act the obedience whicli had been wisely withheld. Moored close in to the 
shore were certain Dutch ships, who, in violation of recent laws, iiad visited 
Virginia for purposes of trade, with batteries mounted on their decks, to 
aid in the defence of the city ; and at yonder bend in tlie shore, was a forti- 
fication of some pretensions, the traces of which may still be discernible, ready 
to open its guns in case of need. At length boats witli white flags are seen 
passing from the shore to the fleet, and from the fleet to the shore. A regiilar 
negotiation is on foot between the parties, whicli terminates to the satisfaction 
of both. By the Commissioners it was stipulated on behalf of the Common- 
wealth of England, that "the trade of Virginia shall be as free as tliat of the 
people of England do enjoy, to all places, and with all nations, according to the 
laws of the Commonwealth. That Virginia shall be free fi-ora all taxes, cus- 
toms, and impositions whatever, without the consent of the Gi-and Assembly, 
so that neither ports or castles be erected, or garrisons maintained without 
their consent." By another article, the fifty-acre freeholds were preserved for 
actual settlei's; and upon the signing of these stipulations, along with others the 
colon}' was transferred to the . ommonwealth. Thus was entered into and con- 
summated a contract, which bears upon its face more the appearance of a treaty 
between two independent nations, than between a powerful mother country 
and a dejieudent colony. The contract thus entered into was faithfully observ- 
ed. While the navigation laws, shortly after passed by the Parliament, drew 
no distinction between the shipping of England and the colonies, yet the pro- 
vision which restricted the colonial trade to British or colonial vessels, and to 
British ports, was never recognized or enforced in Virginia during the Protecto- 
rate. The General Assembly elected their own Governors, and consulted their 
own views of the interests of the colony. Tn all respects there prevailed con- 
tentment and happiness. It is difficult to believe, notwithstanding the opinions 
constantly advanced upon the subject, that there was really entertained b}^ the 
great body of the people any repugnance to the Commonwealth. Such was 
felt by Governor Berkeley undoubtedly, and may have been by a majority of 
the Council ; but that such was the case on the part of the General Assembly 
and their constituents, would seem to be contradicted by after events. Bennet, 
one of Cromwell's Commissioners, was immediately elected Governor, to con- 
tinue as such until the pleasure of the Protector and his Council shoidd be 
made known; and Claiborne, another of the Conunissioners was appointed 
Secretary of State ; and immediately after the death of Oliver Cromwell, his 
son Kichard was acknowledged as the Loi'd Protector. While on the one hand, 
the civil wars and the final execution of Charles I., had induced a large emigra- 
tion of cavaliers to Virginia, the tide of emigration was greatly swollen by 
others, whose motives were essentially diff'ereiit. It is observable, that the 
great majority came over with a view to avail themselves of the gratuity of 
the fifty acre freeholds, while many with abundant means sought to make in- 
vestments in large bodis of lands, as homes for themselves and their descend- 
ants ; and the whole course of hif^tory bears witness to the fact tliat they were 
the advocates of principles diametrically iintagonized to those espoused by 
the Stuarts. While they thought their Assemblies were advocating zealously 
and strenuously the rights of the people, the Stuarts were bigoted supporters 
of the broadest prerogative, and Charles I. was, under the influence of his 
chief Councillor, Wentworth, aiming at thorough — the meaning of which was 
despotic and consolidated sway in the person of the king. While the colonists 
insisted on annual Assemblies, Charles sought to rule without a Parliament, and 
for twenty years abstained from calling one. It is also obsei-vable, that the 
small proprietors usually rallied to leaders, either of their own choosing, or such 
as approximated to their own condition in life. Such was the case in the Bacon 
rebellion, and such, also, occurred in 1765, when Patrick Henry offered his cele- 
brated resolutions. I have it from one who was familiar with the occurrences 
of that day, that the designation of parties which immediately sprung up, and 
the first known in Virginia history, was of "the old-field nags, and the high- 
blooded colts." The first being the warm supporters of Mr. Henry and his 
resolutions — the last, the opponents of both. 

It is worthy of uote, that while the General Assembly is engaged in stipula- 



14 CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

ting foi" freedom of trade and exemption from imports or taxes, it at the same 
time exacts a stipulation against the erection of forts or castles, or the mainte- 
nance of garrisons, without its express assent — a provision which was in its 
most essential point incorporated in the Constitution of the United States un- 
der the reservation of the right of soil on which the fort is proposed by Con- 
gress to be erected, and of Avhieh the State cannot be deprived but by its own 
consent. The policy which dictated this provision in the compact of l<i51, and 
in the Constitution of 1789, was similar in some respects, and dissimilar in 
others. While in both instances it souglit to guard against arbitrary action on 
the part of a stronger power, and arose from that spirit of jealousy which is 
the guardian genius of liberty ; yet the provision of 1651 had in view still 
further objects. It had been the policy of the ruling power in England, by 
the erection of forts at several points where towns were laid off, to force the 
trade into these towns and thereby to render them thriving and prosperous. 
This was a course of great annoyance and expense to the landholders who re- 
sided at a distance from these proposed towns, and had called forth frequent 
and strong remonstrances. They failed not, therefore, to exact the stipulation 
against the recurrence of that policj' in future. Villages, numerous and flourish- 
ing, sprung up in various directions under the concentration of trade produced 
by the Tobacco inspections at various points, but they grew iip under a system 
which was necessary in itself, and unforced in its results. A system which gave 
way before the introduction of the wheat-cradle, which converted the small 
patches of wheat then cultivated into large and extensive fields — waving with 
the golden liarvest. The inspection laws no longer availed ; the concentration 
of trade and the villages at the same time ceased to exist — each landholder 
shipping his produce from his own landing; and Tobacco ultimately retreated 
from the tide-water region, and found its home in the Piedmont district. A 
village opposite to this, called Cobharn, once a place of trade and of note, is a 
true type of others, and there it is, depopulated and in ruins. The attachments 
of the inhabitants of Virginia have been, througli all time, to the country where 
each landholder is an independent sovereign, ruling with a mild and jiatriarchal 
sway; where he practises all the riglits of hospitality — lives in the cultivation 
of the social virtues, and partakes in but few instances of the vices to be found 
in the great thoroughfares of CDininerce. To argue the want of pi'osperity be- 
cause of the absence of large cities, betrays short sightedness and folly. 

With the death of OUver Cromwell, the Commonwealth of England may be 
considered as having passed away. The reins of government fell quietly from 
the hands of his feeble successor, and Charles II., without civil commotion, was 
restored to the throne of his ancestors; and Sir William Berkeley, who had 
been previously elected Governor by the General Assembly, was, soon after the 
restoration, commissioned by tlve king. It was fairly to be inferred that Charles, 
who had seen his father perish on the scaffold, and had himself been reared in 
the school of adversity, would profit by the terrible past, and England, worn 
out by civil broil, hailed the restoration with unfeigned delight. So, also, was 
it with the colony. Doubtless the hope was indulged, that the navigation laws 
of Cromwell's time would continue imperative, which, added to the restoration 
of Sir William Berkeley, who openly advocated free trade, gave universal sat- 
isfaction. The proceedings, therefore, which were adopted by tlie public 
authorities in Viigiiiia may more rationally be ascribed to the reasons I have 
stated, aided by a desire to conciliate the court at London than to any inordi- 
nate attachment to the house of the Stuarts. In the excess of this feeling, the 
Assembly made concessions that nothing can justify, and which they had cause 
seriously to regret. They parted with the great restraining power of annual 
taxation, giving to the Governor the right to impose them for three years. It 
is difficult to excuse the course of adulation whicli the Assembly manifested in 
their proceedings. It has been calculated to impress a false character upon the 
colony that never did belong to it, and which is contradicted by all its previous 
and subsequent history. There is enough in the history of the times to show 
that the gi-eat body of the inhabitants differed essentially from their represen- 
tatives. The private dissatisfaction repeatedly manifested itself in contumeli- 
ous expressions; and the severe punishments visited by the Governor and Coun- 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 15 

cil on the offenders, proves very clearly that they esteemed such course neces- 
sary to restrain others. 

It was soon evident that Virginia had become, by reason of the restoration, 
both at home and abroad, tlie victim of calamitous misrule The navigation 
laws were very soon enforced in regard to her by all who chose to engage in it. 
The free trade which had been profitably carried on was placed under monop- 
oly. Forts were built, against the general wishes, as repeatedly expressed, 
without any good reason. Immense grants of land were made to court favor- 
ites, which often embraced the estates of the small freeholders ; grants, in some 
instances, so large that powerful States have grown out of them ; and, as if to 
overshadow all other usurpations, the despotic power of imposing taxes on the 
export and import trade, was claimed and exercised by the king. In short, 
every stipulation of much value, which had been conceded by the Common- 
wealth, was abrogated by the restored monarch. Discontent had manifested 
itself in localities and particular neighborhoods, which would inevitably have 
become general, but a new and more urgent evil presented itself, and, for the 
time, engrossed the minds of men. The inroads of the Indians, which had be- 
come fiequent and even marked by extreme barbarity, called for immediate 
measures of redress. Sir William Berkeley, in 1674, seemed for a moment to 
have been aroused by the exigencies of the case, and ordered a well-appointed 
body of men under Sir II. Chicherly, to drive them from the frontier*, but with- 
out any apparent cause or change in the condition of things, recalled the troops 
while on their line of march. The people on the Potomac and Rappaliannock 
rivers were the first to take matters into their own hands — a body of men among 
whom were the leading men of that region; and under the command of Col, 
Washington — the grandfather of that George Washington who led our fathers 
to independence, and gave his name to all that is pre-eminently glorious among 
men — assailed and broke the Indian power in that direction, and the renmant 
of the tribes fled to the western frontiers, which were then not far beyond the 
falls of the rivers, where, uniting with other tribes of that region, they made 
their incursions upon the settlers. Their incursions were marked by all the 
atrocities of Indian warfare, and yet Governor Berkelev,'froni iiis palace at 
Jamestown, seemed calmly to look upon the scene without excitement or emo- 
tion. Could it be that the profits of the free trade produced that indifference 
and apathy? His previously high and elevated character would forbid the as- 
cription, but for obvious discrepancies in his character and conduct at different 
stages of life. It is said that avarice, if it once possesses the mind, increases 
with our years, until it occupies us wholly. Fatal passion, which could have 
induced Sir William to complain of the smallness of his perquisites and salary 
when they were adequate and even large, and that, too, after the General As- 
sembly had bestowed upon him Green Spring and three thousand acres of land, 
set apart for the Governors, in absolute right. Whatever it was that produced 
the lethargy with the Governor, the same cause did not operate on the inhabi- 
tants. I need not dwell on the incidents whicli shortly after transpired, and 
which has come down to us under the name of Bacon's Rebellion. 

The population of the colony numbered forty-five thousand, and never was 
there a greater unanimity in any public movement. Suffice it to say, that the 
Royal Governor, while he exhibited a courage worthy of his station, had to 
seek shelter from the storm by fleeing across the bay ; and in order to render 
his return to the government impracticable, the resolution was taken by Bacon 
and his victorious followers, to consign Jamestown to ashes. And in October, 
1676, the torch was applied to its edifices. The raging element did not even 
spare the sacred edifice in which our forefathers daily offered up their ])rayers 
to the Most High. The altar before which Pocahontas had knelt when she 
received the rite of baptism, and at which she also plighted her faith in mar- 
riage — and at which good Master Hunt had officiated — all was consumed by 
the fire; and nothing was left standing but yon broken steeple, which lias con- 
tinued to be the land-mark of centuries, and the aged sentinel over the dust of 
departed generations. The town was afterwards partially rebuilt, and many 
of its houses remained during my early novitiate at William and Mary College. 
Thej' stood in a connected street, running east and west, from near the present 
dwelling-house to the ruins of the church. 



;16 CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

For two years Virginia was exempt from all foreign control. Assemblies 
were held at Williamsburg, which passed laws, levied war against the Indians, 
and conducted public affairs as if free from the rule of any power whatever. 
In anticipation of the arrival of troops from England to reinstate Sir William 
Berkeley, and to enforce the odious regulations to which I have adverted, after 
a debate which lasted until midnight, in which Bacon put forth all his powers 
of eloquence, the General Assembly adopted the resolution to oppose any forces 
sent out against the colony without a stipulation for a full hearing befoi'C the 
King and Parliament; and that resolution was swoi-n to by all the people. 
Under the lead of that truly great man, the colony had thus placed itself upon 
ground which, had he lived, would have required the whole disposable force of 
Great Britain to have shaken from under them. He had already quieted the 
border troubles by inflicting a terrible vengeance upon the Indians, which had 
spread the terror of his name among the most distant tribes; and having re- 
solved not to lay down his arms until a full redress of grievances was obtained, 
he awaited with a firm resolve the arrival of the expected forces from England. 
Judging from his well authenticated career, we can entertain no doubt that he 
would have braved all dangers, sooner than have surrendered his position ; and 
considering the disturbances which at the time existed in England, it maj' be 
well doubted whether the king could have sent over a force sufficient to have 
defeateil him. There was one pei-son in the colony, and that a woman, who 
had no fear of the king achieving any such victory, and prophesied for Vir- 
giiua a glorious triumph over wrong and oppi'cssion. That woman was Sarah 
Drumrnond, who has deservedly taken her place on the page of romance. Her 
husband fell a victim to the inlumian policy of Sir William Berkeley, but she 
demanded justice at the hands of England ; and she persevered until the Gov- 
ernor was com])elled to pay a round sum for his illegal proceeding. Fate, how- 
ever, decreed that the conflict between the mother and the daughter should 
not then occur. Nathaniel Bacon soon after ceased to live. He died, regretted 
by the colony, at the house of Mr. Pate, in Gloucester, and to avoid the dese- 
cration of his remains, his body was so secretly interred by "'thoughtful Mr. 
Lawrence," that no man knows to this day his burial place. I have stood near 
the place where he breathed his last, and often visited Peterworth church, — 
now all in ruins, where the pious fraud was committed, the secret known only 
to Lawrence, of entombing a coflBn filled with stones, attended by all the im- 
pressive ceremonies of the Episcopal church, in substitution for his body. With 
him the soul of the revolution [)assed away, and Sir William Berkeley, like a 
madman in his rage, resumed tiie chair of State. 

Had Bacon lived a century later, he might have occupied the highest niche 
in the temple of fame Liberally educated, possessed of high attainments, and 
being ekxjuent, forcible, and persuasive as a public speaker, he might have 
taken rank with the greatest men of the I'evolution. The thrilling tones of his 
eloquence would have been heard seconding the resolutions of Mr. Henry iu 
17(J5, and his sword would afterwards have been seen flashing over the battle- 
fields of the war for independence. Untrained to arms, he became almost by 
intuition a distinguished Captain, sweeping from before him all inqjediments iu 
the way of his success. He annihilated tlie Indian power, and with one hun- 
dred and fifty men, expelled Governor Beikeley from Jamestown, although at 
the head of a large body of recruits. He wanted but a wider field for the dis- 
play of abilities of a high and rare order. As it is, Ave recognize in him a de- 
voted advocate o*" popular rights, and an inflexible opponent of wrong and 
opiu'ession. He achieved the virtual independence of the colony for two years, 
and in view of the distracted state of England at the time, the belief may fairly 
be indulged, that he would have enforced upon Charles a full recognition of the 
rights of Virginia. 

Sir William Berkeley constitutes in himself a study for the anatomist of 
character and the passions. To great refinement of manners, he added a culti- 
vated taste for letters ; and had acquired some eclat, by the production of a 
tragi-comedy, called "The Lost Lady." For many years of his long adminis- 
tration of public affairs, he won for prerogative, by gentleness and urbanity of 
manners, what Charles lost by violence and obstinacy. His courtesy in the or- 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 17 

■dinary intercoiirse of society was only equalled by his habitual deference, and 
lespect for the General Assembly. The advocate of the divine right of kings, 
and he, the reflex of their image and authority, nevertheless courted the 
populace, and won, in a large degree, the attachment of the people to his per- 
son and government. A cavalier and a gentleman, he suffered no eclipse of the 
Royal sun to divert his affections from She Stuart dynasty. Whether the one 
perished on the scaff'old or the other was a fugitive and exile, Sir William's 
gaze was still fixed on them, and all his political affinities centered in them. 
We cannot but admire his firm and unshaken devotion to the Stuarts, whatever 
our own opinions may be in regard to them. With a Governor so mild and 
bland in his manners, and apparently so little inclined to tliwart the public 
will, by the exercise of his power, it is not to be wondered at that there should 
have been no serious manifestations of dislike to the rule of Charles I. Let it 
also be borne in mind, that his predecessor in office, because of his overbearing 
and tyrannical temper, which seemed never to be satisfied unless he had some 
great principle of popular liberty to destroy, or some extraordinary exaction 
to enforce, had finally stirred up the great mass to revolution, which was con- 
Bummated by his expulsion from the colony. The contest between the two 
was striking, and that democratic mass which had been so upheaved by a deep 
sense of wrong under the one, was contented and at rest under the other. His 
active co-operation with the Assembly and Council in the defence of James- 
town against Cromwell's fleet was calculated still further to attach to Sir Wil- 
liam the people of the colony, while his surrender of the supreme power after 
agreement upon terms between the Legislature and the Connnissioners was both 
graceful and dignified. He retired to his handsome mansion at Green Spring, 
which still stands, some three miles from this, and deserves to be classed with 
the best houses of Virginia at this day. 

Such was the character and conduct of Sir William Berkley, from his inau- 
guration as Governor in 1642, to the surrender of the colony into the hands of 
the Commonwealth, in 1651. What trace of resemblance exists between thig 
same man before the time of the Commonwealth and after? The restoration 
of Charles 11. to the English throne was speedily followed by his restoration 
to the Governorship of Virginia. Doubtless he had brooded in silence over 
the passing events, and in view of the blood of Charles L streaming from the 
scaffold, had cherislied a gloomy and intolerant spirit. Perhaps he had also 
censured in his heart, on many occasions, the want of decision and firmness on 
the part of the King's advisers ; thus he overlooked the happy fruits of mild- 
ness and forbearance which had distinguished his early career, and adopted in 
their place a high-handed and despotical temper. Tlie high-toned cavalier de- 
Bcended from the lofty eminence of truth and candor, to low subterfuge, and 
the petty game of deception in his dealing with Bacon, to whom he granted a 
commission as General, and sanctioned his proceeding against the Indians, and 
(JO soon as he had withdrawn from Jamestown, proclaimed him a traitor along 
with all who had marched under his banner, the unfurling of which he himself 
had justified by his most solemn assent. His political vision was blinded to 
tile fact, that an Indian war was the readiest mode which sound policy would 
have suggr^sted, to divert the public mind from the invasion of their privilege* 
by the acts of the Government, which had produced a feeling of angry excite- 
ment. It was sufficient cause that the movement had not originated with him, 
to induce him to condemn it as rebellious and treasonable. It was quite 
*;uough that the people should select a leader of tiieir own, without consult- 
ing his wishes, to make him a rancorous and bitter enemy of that leader, and 
all who followed him. To gratify that enmity, he abrogated not only the char- 
tered rights of the colonists, but subverted the laws of England by the estab- 
lishment of martial law, and was not turned from his coiirse until the General 
Assembly, sickened by the quantity of blood which he had shed, admonished 
him that he had waded far enough in blood; and my Lord Coke, the Chief 
Justice of England, pronounced his proceedings to be illegal. To glut his ven- 
geance after that leader had fallen a victim to disease and death, he forgot so 
far tlie principles of humanity, as to assume the part of the hyena, and to 
burrow into the grave of the man who had triumphed over him, with the 

2 



l8 CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

view of disinterring his remains, and exposing them upon a gibbet. Fortu- 
nately for tlie cause of liumanity and reason, he was baffled in his barbarous 
design; and yet to be avoided, and to die neglected by the sovereign whose 
family he had so long served, to be scoffed at as "an old fool," by King Charles 
himself, for the blood he had shed in Virginia, was to his proud and sensitive 
nature the worst of punishments — as was the death j^roduced by it the worst 
of deaths — the death of the broken heart. 

Time is not allowed me to do more than to glance at some few of the inci- 
dents which followed the death of Sir William Berkeley. The contest between 
prerogative and privilege, was often warmly waged between the people anjj 
their Governors; and on one occasion the storm raged fearlully. It was quiet- 
ed, as on previous occasions, by the expulsion of the governor, and the triumph 
of principle. After the great revolution in England of 1688, the disturbances 
•were shortlived and ephemeraL The government assumed a form of more sta- 
bility, and the righls of the people came to be more thoroughly recognized. 
Although the charter to the London company had contained a provision for the 
trial by jury, yet there was the absence of any stipulation for the habeas corpus. 
The introduction of this great remedy against tyrannical misrule, should im- 
mortalize the name of Alexander Spotswood, who introduced it upon his instal- 
lation as Governor. I do not go here into the question whether the settlers did 
not come here clothed in all the rights whicli api^ertained to Englishmen. Upon 
that point, I presume, there would be at tliis day no difference of opinion be- 
tween the courts at Westminster Hall and those at Richmond. It is enough to 
say, that the writ of habeas corpus had never been resorted to, and was not 
recognized as existing by the authorities. Under the administration of Alex- 
ander Spotswood, the colony expanded in ever}' direction. For the first time, 
in 1714, the Blue Ridge was crossed by his Knights of the Golden Hore-shoe, 
with their motto of sic juvat transcandere monies ; and settlements were soon 
after made in the fertile and beautiful Valley of Viriiinia. He opened a mine 
of inexhaustible wealth to the Colony and State, by the establishment of exten- 
sive Iron-works; and in many other respects, proved himself to be a wise and 
patriotic chief magistrate. The General Assembly now claimed and exercised 
all the privileges of an English Parliament; and peace and quiet prevailed 
throughout Viiginia. I remember, when at college, to have seen his pew in 
the church at Williamsburg — to which city the government was removed in 
1705, surmounted by a canopy with "Alexander Spotswood" emblazened upon 
it in gilded letters. The spirit of innovation, some years ago, removed that 
memorial of the past. 

I have said, that the civil wars in England, and the bitter contests betweeh 
the Kings and Parliaiuents, had caused a broad stream of emigration to flow 
into the colony. Tiie religious controversies of the times aided in swelling the 
stream, and from tlie lime'of the revolution of 1688, there seems to have exist- 
ed a spiiit of toler-ation, which admitted all without serious regard to their re- 
ligious opinions. The disciples of Fox were permitted to settle in the colony, 
and the Presbyterians had several places of worship. At a still later day, the 
revocation of the edict of Naiitz caused a new and valuable admixture of jiopu- 
lation, by the influx of numbers of Huguenots, who were sent over by William 
of Orange — to whom lands were assigned. Shortly after, other religious sects 
multiplied in the colony, and everytiiing already pointed to that great act, 
which has immortalized the name of its author — the act establishing religious 
freedom. These then distant wilds held out to the oppressed of other climes 
homes of comparative quiet. Here they came for freedom to worship the 
Creator after the dictates of their own consciences; and here, amid piimeval 
forests, they found it. The actual disciimination in favor of the church of Eng- 
land, consisted in an imposilion upon all for its support — a discrimination which 
it had been far better for that church, if it had never been made, as it ultimate- 
ly united all other sects against it, and produced, for a season, its almost entire 
prostration. 

Before the close of Governor Spotswood's administration, Virginia had in- 
creased greatly in wealth, in power, and in population ; and before the middle 
of the eighteenth century, began to perform an important part. I cannot 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 19 

dwell upon incidents with which all are familiar. The traveller, as he wends 
his way over the Cumberland road, lingers amid those mountain passes by the 
grave of the unfortunate Braddock — who, if he had listened to tlie youthful 
Virginia officer, would have avoided an inglorious defeat, and escaped an un- 
fortunate death. The spirit of Virginia rose under tliat defeat, and shortly 
after, gallant men were arming to drive from Fort Pitt, and the frontiers, the 
combined forces of the French and Indians. Nor was tliere wanting to xirge 
them on, the impassioned and eloquent language of one, whose teachings 
were those of the Divine Saviour of mankind, of "peace on earth, and good 
will to men." I have, in my possession, the gift of an esteemed friend, a 
sermon, remarkable for its force and eloquence, delivered before Captain 
Overton's company of Hanover volunteers, at their request, in August, 1755, 
more than an hundred years ago, by tiie Rev. Samuel Davies, an eminent 
Presbyterian minister, who officiated at Pole Green meeting-house— which is 
still a place of worship — and who became, at a later day, President of Prince- 
ton College. The sermon, apart from its intrinsic merits, which are con- 
siderable, is rendered forever remarkable by reason of a prophecy made 
by the preacher, and appended in a note: "1 may point out to the public," 
said he, "that heroic youth. Colonel Washington, whom I cannot but hope 
Providence has hitherto preserved, in so signal a manner, for some important 
service to his country." How fully that prophecy was fulfilled let all subse- 
quent history prove; let the thousands who annually visit Mount Vernon, on 
an almost holy pilgrimage— the devotion manifested to his memory by the 
lovers of freedom, all over the world — the unanimous verdict of mankind in 
favor of his disinterested patriotism — the wish everywhere so warmly express- 
ed by our wives, and sisters, and daughters, to render sacred from intrusion the 
spot where his body is interred — let'all, all, testify that the name of George 
Washington is rendered, while man and earth endures, immortal among men. 
The women of America would manifest their gratitude to his memory, by 
placing the urn containing his ashes in the custody and safe-keeping of his own 
beloved Virginia. And can there be a heart that does not respond to the sen- 
timent, or a Virginia-born man who would not contribute his aid towards its 
accomplishment ? 

We have thus far traced the progress of this noble Commonwealth. I have 
studied no j-hetorical art, and have attempted no figurative embellishment. A 
simple, unadorned narrative of prominent events in all that I have aspired to 
give. We deduce from them the sjiirit which animated our forefathers. We 
have seen with what unanimity all efl'orts to trample upon the rights of the 
colony were opposed. The large landholders and the small ; the cavalier and 
the Commonwealth man, and, at an after day, the men who came over subse- 
quent to the great Revolution which placed William of Orange on the throne, 
all, with few exceptions, are found uniting in support of the rights of the colony, 
and, upon occasion, expelling for violation of those rights the vicegerents of the 
sovereign. As early as 1624, when but a comparative handful had settled these 
broad acre^, now occupied by millions, the right of exemption from taxation, ex- 
cept through their Grand Assemblies, was boldly asserted and was ever after 
maintained. Here too was adopted in advance of England herself, the principle 
of the great Petition of Right. No wonder then, that, when at an after day, 
the British government, blindly forgetful of our previous history, undertook to 
impose tlie "stamp tax, the voice of an ofl'ended people, now grown strong and 
powerful, should have awakened the old echoes in the State house, andtliat the 
thunder of an indignant eloquence should have shaken "the Philip of the seas-* 
no wonder that at a later day the attempt to impose taxes on imports should 
have stirred up the spirit of disturbance and revolt. Before other colonies had 
existence, Virginia had taken her position on that point; and when other com- 
munities had sprung up around her, most of whom were located within the 
limits of her original charter, she hailed them as allies in a common cause, and 
led the way in the contest. The thunder-tones of her Henry aroused such as 
slumbered to a knowledge of the great matters in issue ; and her enlighted states- 

*It is worthy of perpetual remembrance that the resolution adopted in 176.5, is almost in 
words, certainly in substance, the same with that passed by the General Assembly in 1624. 



20 CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

men pointed out the way which led to success. Nearly two years before the great 
declaration was issued by Congress, she had armed against the acts of the last 
of her royal governors, who fled from her wrath and found shelter on board a 
man-of-war. Her call for a convention of the people was equivalent to an actiial 
Declaration of Independence, and she was engaged in hostilities before that call 
was made. Dunmore still hung upon her coast, prosecuting a war of pillage 
and plunder. He proclaimed emancipation to the negroes; and invited them 
to join his standard. They did so in large numbers; and humanity, at this day, 
weei)S over their cruel suli'erings. Many were sent to the West Indies, while 
others were sent to New York tu be forwarded elsewhere. From an aged citizen 
of Staten Island,* I learned, a few years ago, that the marble mercantile palace 
of A. T. Stewart is built upon the burial place of 3,000 of those unfortunates. 

If Virginia still spoke of loyalty to the crown, it was only until she could 
fully adjust her armor. No one who will consult the annals of that day, can 
doubt upon the subject. It was fitting that a colony so nurtured and reared, 
should be the first to lay down and announce the great principles of public and 
private right. It was fitting that she, the oldest of the crown, should have 
been the first to give to the world the example of a permanent written Consti- 
tution. It was fitting that she should have simimoned her sisters to a Continental 
Congress. It was fitting that she should have issued in advance of others, her 
instructions to her delegates to move a declaration of independence, and that 
they should have ob<!yed her commands; and it was right and proper that her 
noble and ever glorious son should have conducted the armies of the confederacy 
to victory and to ti-iuniph. It was right that her Morgan should have led her 
invincible rifles at Saratoga, and that he should have thrown them like thunder- 
bolts against liurgoyne's serried ranks; and that then and there should have 
broken forth for the first time the animating strains of Yankee Doodle, since 
become a National air. It was not only right that her ensign should have 
floated over every battle-field ; but that her bugle notes should also have been 
heard in triumph at Yorktown. It was, and is full of glory, eternal as the 
mountains, that as the first impress of the Anglo Saxon was made on this beach, 
so the first impulse to independence was given at Williamsburg, and the last 
battle for liberty was fought at Yorktown. The voice of an indignant eloquence 
proceeding from thk old capitol, and the shouts of an exulting army at York- 
town miglit have been heard by one ruminating here amid the tombs of the 
early settlers ; and it was right that it should be so. Those settlers were the 
pioneers two hundred and fifty years ago ol all that has followed. They perished, 
but out of their ashes has arisen an empire of almost boundless extent. Observe 
the grand procession as it moves on its way to reclaim a new world. There is 
no exodus of a people as in the case of the Israelites from Egypt. Each move 
is but the addition of a new link to the chain of empire. The sons have left the 
hearth-stones to find for themselves new homes; but fathers and mothers and 
kinsfolk are left behind, and constantly recurring memories keep the chain 
bright and free from rust. The wilderness is reclaimed, cultivat(Ml fields 
abound, and villages, towns, and cititis mark the stages of its progress, and the 
procession moves on aiul on, as in the morning of its existence. As their de- 
scendants, and of those who followed them, we have a right to demand of all 
such as revile and abuse Virginia, from what great act or noble deed recorded 
in the history of America, has she withheld her name, or when did she give 
stintingly of her blood or treasure to the public good? Under the conduct of 
her gallant son, George Rogers Clai'ke, through her unaided means, she swept 
away from the Northwest the combined hosts of French, and Indians, thus 
vindicating her chartered rights, and rounding ofi" an empire great as that of 
the Cffisars; and with a liberality which nothing but the motive which prompted 
it can excuse, she yielded it all to aj>pease to the jealousy of her confederates, 
and to consolidate the Union. Did she withhold her aid in the building up, 
and giving form and substance to the political institutions under which we live, 
and which have become the admiration of the world? Go to the historian, and 
he will show you, upon his pages, the names of her eminent sons in connexioa 

* Mr. Isaac BelU 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 21 

■with each great work. When those institutions have been assailed in any vital 
part, has she carelessly folded her arms chaiuiting praises to the Union, without 
repelling the assault or admonishing her confederates of the danger? Her 
course in 1798-99, when the liberty of speech and the press were assailed, and 
through all time, demonstrates the reverse. And there she is still a sentinel on 
the watch tower to repel the sappers and miners who would overthrow the 
great constitutional charter of these States. Has she, by supporting a mistaken 
policy, retarded the growth of the confederacy, jiaralyzed its commerce, or 
abridged its powers? Let ocean answer to ocean, and while bearing upon their 
waters the largest commercial marine the world has ever known belonging to 
one people, let them testify to the hap|)y fruits of the policy which was inau- 
gurated by Washington, and enforced by Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe 
Political demagogues may revile and abuse, but they cannot detract from the 
high and lofty fame which belongs to tliis time-honored Commonwealth, or dis- 
turb her in the continued advocacy of that course of policy, conservative and 
national as it is, which she has through all time puisued. Here amid the 
graves of our ancestors, we renew our pledges to those principles of self-govern- 
ment, which have been consecrated by their examples through two hundred 
and fifty years ; and implore that Great Being who so often and signally pre- 
Beived thein through trials and difficulties, to continue to our country Ills pro- 
tecting guardianshij) and care. 

At the closing of the Oration, which was listened to throughout 
with uninterrupted and breathless attention, Mr. James Barkon Hope, 
of Hampton, Va., was introduced, and delivered the following 

POEM. 

I walk these ancient haunts with reverent tread 
And Seem to gaze upon the mighty dead ; 
Imagination calls a nol)Ie train 
From dust and darkness back to life again. 

[ViKOiNiA : a Poem by J. R. Tuompson. 

Down the steep, mi^ty crags of antique time 
Leaps many a torrent in a surge sublime, 
Pouring along its mystic flood, till pale 
And dim, it bursts in some sequested vale, 
Some valley of the Fast, lone and remote, 
Where myths and legends fancifully float 
In mists through which Tradition and Romance, 
AsTARTE-twins, above the torrent glance; 
Where splendid hues illumine each rugged fact 
Which, rock-like bounds the rushing cataract ; 
Where purple shadow o'er each scene descends 
And Poesie her soft enchantment lends; 
Where vanished things — the very simplest — glow 
With a strange beauty, which doth float and flow 
Around them, in such rich and gorgeous dyes 
As Autumn's sunset mingles in our skies. 

Our hist'ry. Brothers, such grand torrent makes ; 
This spot, the valley where in spray it breaks. 
Which, wreathed in columns or dispersed in dews, 
Takes from the past its varigated hues. 
And here we meet, this sacred day apart. 
To muse in solemnness of mind and heart. 
While over us, like banner, floats the mist 
By fair Romance and bright tradition kist. 



22 CELEBKATION AT JAMESTOWN". 

And, through these mists, what epic scenes arise ! 
What stoned pictures start before our eyes! 
What grand, historic forms, superb and vast, 
Loom tlirough the vapors gathered o'er the past! 
While high above is seen God's awful hand 
Writing, my Brothers, slowly out, His grand, 
Sublime decree, which the great Genoese 
Transcribed of old upon the might}' seas — 
Transcribed with those three keels which long ago 
Fretted the billows into wakes of snow. 
While through sad days and nights devoid of sleep, 
He ploughed the bosom of the azure deep. 

The keels which sailed upon that sultry morn — 

When priestly chant and deep sonorous horn 

Broke on the summer air; when, all agape. 

The speculative throng saw them escape 

Their moorings in the tranquil, sunny bay — 

Those caravellas — went upon God's way. 

And though ten thousand storms have swept the deep, 

And calms have lulled it in delusive sleep — 

Though, for long ages, it has tossed and yearned, 

As starlight shone, or crimson sunset burned — • 

Still on the ocean — type though it may be 

Of all that's boundless, unsubdued and free — 

Remains the record to all time unfurled, 

How God gave man, the second time, a world. 

One heaven-directed genius laid his hand 

Upon the hilt of Providence; the brand 

Required the force of the human race 

To draw it from its scabbard's resting place — 

Ages to wield it in the noble van 

Which gave this Western Hemisphere to man. 

Fain would I linger on that splendid age. 

To which he gave its brightest page; 

Fain sing his god-like majesty of mind, 

Which looked right onward — never glanced behind, 

While, 'neath his brow, lit with the glow of hope. 

It, toiling, cast the whole world's horoscope. 

Fain would 1 paint his griefs in those sad hours 

When all his hopes seemed like the last year's flowers ; 

Fain follow him through all his dreary years 

Of pain and poverty and bitter tears; 

From convent porch to regal palace gate, 

Tracing his footsteps as he charged on Fate, 

Which built new ramparts in his path each day 

Until his brow was knit — his dark locks gray. 

Fain would I pause at Palos, Avhen the breeze 

His caravellas swept toward unknown seas; 

Fain follow where his daring vessels sped, 

Strange tides beneath — strange planets overhead; 

Fain would I dwell upon that happy day, 

When, on the new-found shore, he knelt to pray: 

That Easter-day, when, with the great seas' boom. 

Making the music of his mass, the tomb 

Gave up his dream, which, tiow in beauty rose. 

Like Christ awakened after His repose. 

Was this the thought! Christ's was the name he gave 

To that fair island smiling on the wave. 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 2|3 

And the poor Indian ! would I might narrate 

His piteous story and his tragic fate! 

A great mind tells us, that, on all earth's sods, 

Men crucify, and then adore, their gods; 

There ' twas reversed — in blood the land was dyed, 

And deities their vot'ries crucified. 

Had I the space, I well might pause to scan 

The varied fortunes of this wondrous man ; 

Might follow through those ever sunny isles, 

Where Nature wears her very sweetest smiles; 

Deck'd in a crown of ever-blooming flowers, 

Of richer hues and sweeter still than ours; 

Where purple twilights tint the evening seas. 

And calm stars write their solemn mysteries 

In skies which seem to be the azure shield, 

Where God's own arms are blazon'd on the field — 

Where strand and ocean — earth and star-lit sky 

With one accord give "Atheos"' the lie. 

But to be brief: for images apace 
Crowd on my fancy, claiming each a place. 
As stars claim places in a tranquil night — 
So thick they come — but not, alas ! so bright ; 
In brief, then. Brothers, to my humble song 
I've made the prelude ample thus and long. 
As some musician, who distrusts his art. 
Will hum a bar before he takes his part. 
But not alone for this, have I delayed ; 
For other j)urpose, too, my fingers strayed 
Along the harp strings, as 'twere in a dream 
My purpose was to weave into my theme 
These liumble praises of the brain profound 
Which wrapped in slumber, all its era found ; 
Yet woke the age from its long, fevered sleep — 
Roused by the voices of the mighty deep. 

And though Spain's Admiral slumbered in the grave, 
He left a beacon blazing o'er the wave. 
And, as years sped, the light he left waxed great — 
The light he'd stricken from the flint of Fate — 
Rousing all Europe, as that flame antique 
Awoke to triumph the exultant Greek. 

At last the visions, vast and iindefined, 

Which long had gathered in the general mind. 

Marched forth in actions ; and the age's crest 

Flickered with fires enkindled in the West, 

A splendid plume! whieli flamed and flared and flowed 

As, lance in rest, the era westward rode. 

What dreams men dreamt beneath the general spell, 

What visions saw — I need not pause to tell. 

Nor how the tide of human fate was rolled 

Upon its course by love of fame or gold, 

Nor how that flood was stained in this fair clime 

By blood and tears — rapacity and crime. 

I pause not now, to speak of Raleigh's schemes, 
Tho' they might give a loflier bard fit themes; 
I pause not now, to tell of Ocracock, 
Where Saxon spray broke on the red-brown rock; 



24 CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

Nor of my native river, which glides down 

Through scenes where rose a happy Indian town; 

But, leaving these and Chesapeake's broad bay. 

Resume my story in the month of May, 

When England's cross — St. George's ensign flowed 

Where ne'r before emblazoned banner glowed — 

When English hearts throbbed fast, as English eyes 

Looked o'er the waters with a glad surprise — 

Looked gladl}' out upon the varied scene. 

Where stretched the woods in all their pomp of green ; 

Flinging great shadows — beautiful and vast, 

As e'er upon Arcadian lake were cast. 

Turn where they would — in what direction rove. 

They found some baj', or wild, romantic cove. 

On which they coasted through those forests dim, 

In which they heard the never ceasing hymn 

That swelled from all the tall, majestic pines — 

Fit choristers of Nature's sylvan shrines! 

F'or, though no Priest their solitudes had trod, 

The trees were vocal in their praise of God, 

Wailing grand passages and bars sublime, 

To which religion in their hearts beat time. 

And then, when capes and jutting headlands past, 

The sails were furled against each idle mast, 

They saw the sunset in its pomp descend 

And sky and water gloriously contend 

In gorgeousness of colors, red and gold, 

And tints of amethyst together rolled. 

Making a scene of splendor and of rest 

As vanquished day lit camp-fires in the West. 

And when the light grew faint on wave and strand, 

New beauties woke in this enchanting land ; 

For through Heav'n's lattice-work of crimson bars 

Like angels, looked the bright, eternal stars. 

And then, when gathered tints of purplish brown, 

A golden sickle, reaping darkness down, 

The new moon slione above the giant trees 

Which made low music in the evening breeze; 

The breeze which floating blandly from the shore. 

The perfumed breath of flow'ring jasmine bore; 

For smiling Spring had kist its clust'ring vines 

And breathed her fragrance on the lofty pines. 

In those vast forests dwelt a race of kings. 
Free as the eagle when he spreads his wings — 
His wings which never in their wild flight lag — 
In mists which fly the fierce tornado's flag; 
Their flight the eagle's! and their name, alas! 
The eagle's shadow swooping o'er the grass, 
Or, as it fades, it well may seem to be 
The shade of tempest driven o'er the sea. 

Fierce too, this race, as mountain torrent wild. 

With haughty hearts, where Mercy rarely smiled — 

All their traditions — histories imbued 

With tales of war and sanguinary feud, 

Yet though they never couched the knightly lance. 

The glowing songs of Europe's old romance 

Can find their parallels amid tlie race 

Which, on this spot, met England face to face. 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 25 

And wlien they met the white man hand to hand, 
Twilight and sunrise stood npon the strand — 
Twilight and sunrise? Saxon sunshine gleams 
To-day o'er prairies, and those distant streams 
Which hurry onward tlirough far Western plains, 
Where the last Indian, for a season, reigns. 

Here, the red Canute, on this spot, sat down, 

His splendid forehead storjiiy with a frown. 

To quell, with the wild lightning of liis glance 

The swift encroachment of the wave's advance; 

To meet and check the ruthless tide which rose. 

Crest after crest of energetic foes. 

While higli and strong poui-ed on each cruel wave, 

Until they left his ro^'alty — a grave ; 

But, o'er this wild, tumultous deluge glows 

A vision fair as heaven to Saint e'er shows; 

A dove of mercy o'er the billows dark 

Fluttered awhile, then fled within God's ark. 

Had I the power, I'd reverently describe 

That peerless maid — the "pearl of all her tribe," 

As evening fair, when coming night and day 

Contend together which shall wield its sway. 

But, here, abashed, my paltry fancy stays; 

For her, too humble it most stately lays. 

A shade of twilight's softest, sweetest gloom — 

The dusk of morning — found a splendid tomb 

In England's glare; so strange, so vast, so bright, 

The dusk of morning bursted into light. 

Which falleth through the Past's cathedral aisles, 

Till sculptured Mercy like a seraph smiles. 

And though Fame's grand and consecrated fane 

No kingly statue may, in time, retain. 

Her name shall linger, nor with age grow faint; 

Its simplest sound — the image of a Saint! 

Sad is the story of that maiden's race. 

Long driven from each legendary place. 

All their expansive hunting-grounds are now 

Torn by the iron of the Saxon's plough. 

Which turns up skulls and arrow-heads and bones — 

Their places nameless and unmarked by stones. 

Now freighted vessels toil along the view. 

Where once was seen the Indians' bark canoe; 

And to the woods the shrill escaping steam 

Proclaims our triumph in discordant scream. 

Where rose the wigwam in its sylvan shade. 

Where the bold hunter in his freedom strayed, 

And met his foe or chased the bounding stag. 

The lazy horses at the harrow lag. 

Where the rude dance was held or war-song rose. 

The scene is one of plenty and repose. 

The quiver of her race is empty now. 

Its bow lies broken underneath the plough ; 

And where the wheat-fields ripple in the gale, 

The vanished hunter scarcely leaves a trail. 

'Twas where yon river musically flows. 

The European's momenclature rose ; 

A keen-edged axe, which since, alas ! has swept 

Away their names — those boughs, which blossoms kept. 



26 CELEBEATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

Leaving so few, tliat, when their story's drowned, 
'Twill sink, alas! with no fair garland crowned. 
What strange vicissitudes and perils fell 
On the first settlers, 'tis not mine to tell; 
I scarce may pause to syllable the name 
Which the great captain left behind to fame; 
A name wliicli echoes through the tented past 
Like sound of charge rung in a bugle's blast. 
His age, although it still put faith in stars, 
No longer glanced through feudal helmet's bars, 
But stood in its half armor ; thus stands he 
An image half of Border chivalry, 
And half presented to our eager eyes. 
The brilliant symbol of brave enterprise. 
A knightly blade, without one spot of rust, 
Undimmed by time and undefaced by dust. 
His name hangs up in that past age's hall, 
Where many hang, the brightest of them all. 

And here at last, there rose the rambling town, 
A smile contending with the forest's frown, 
And busy sounds were borne upon the breeze. 
The swarming hum of England's settling bees. 
Would I might linger on those ancient times, 
Whose stories swell with yet unwritten rhymes; 
Would I might paint the dames and cavaliers, 
Whose stately forms glide down the vanished years, 
Where faintly, through the dusky purple shade, 
Gleam jewelled hilt and golden wrought brocade; 
Whence, with a sweet and necromatic spell 
Music and laughter, song and perfume swell. 
AVould I might pause 'neath yonder tower, which now 
No longer hears response or fervid vow ; 
Which only echoes to the plaintive hymn 
Made by the night wind, when the stars are dim. 
Where prayers for kings and Parliaments arose, 
Waves the wild vine and nodding cowslip blows. 
There Solitude — that giave and solemn priest — 
For meditation spreads its sacred feast ; 
And standing grey in sunsliine and in blast. 
It seemed embodied "Amen" o'er the past; 
An "Amen" o'er the bui'ied past, which I, 
A ghostly shade have dimly seen flit by.* 

How England's arts and institutions rose, — 
Themselves her misdirected rule's worst foes, — 
Was his to tell, whose eloquence, of old 
Hath borne rapt senates on its tide of gold ; 
Whose name a calm and stately radiance throws 
Upon our history, like the sun's repose; 
Where, sinking slowly in a flood of light, 
Serene as he is wonderfully bright! 
The shut past, like that hardy plant which clings 
Upon the cliffs, o'er which sweep condor's wings, 
Has all its leaves unclosed beneath the spray, 
Flung from his limpid eloquence to-day. 



* The modern Dyasdust will find a most interesting history of this venerable ruin in the 
"Church Review," (Vol VIII., No. I.,) from the pen of that accomplished and zealous anti- 
quary, the Key. John Collins McCabe, Hector of the "Ascension," Baltimore. 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 27 

One other name ; but no ! my song is done : 

As well might Persian, who adores the sun, 

Think that, by hymns or solemn-ehaunted lays, 

He gave new splendor to his bright god's rays, 

As /aspire, in any song of mine. 

To make that name in greater lustre shine. 

Its fittest place is on Virginia's brow, 

As, kneeling down, to God she sends her vow — 
, That, as her great son left lier, she will be ; 
/ And live on proudly — free amid the free ; 
( Or, finding that she may not thus remain, 

Like Samson, grasp the pillars of the fane. 

And leave all wreck, where erst in pride it rose, 
\ Tomb for herself in common with her foes. 

Governor Wise, who was on the stand, in response to numerous 
and enthusiastic calls from the audience, thus addressed it: 

Ml/ Friends and Fellow- Citizens : 

I can add nothing to what has been said. I am not prepared with a speech, 
and the]'e is no apology for one after what we have heard. Your story has 
been well "said" and well "sung." Your State can still boast, as this day 
proves, that she has yet left to her a sage (Mr. Tyler) and a poet (Mr. Hope.) 
I have heard it said to men : "Shake oft" the dust from thy feet, for tlie ground 
on which you stand is holy ;" and this place is sacred, but I say to you that we 
will not shake its dust oft' our feet, for the place whereon we stand is our Home- 
dust. We will cliug to this soil, and this soil to us, forever! 

Our State, I believe is the only State which has had her tliree capitals. Here 
is the spot where was her first, and her's was the first of all the States. Here 
the Old World first met the New. Here the Wliite man first met the Red, for 
settlement and colonization. Here the White man first wielded the axe to cut 
the first tree, for the first log cabin ! Here the first log cabin was built for the 
first village ! Here thQ first village rose to be i\\e first i^tate capital ! Here waa 
the first capital of our empire of States — here was tlie very foundation of a 
nation of freemen which has stretelied its dominion and its millions across the 
continent to the shores of another ocean I Go to the I'acific, now, to measure 
this progression and power of a great people! I 

Virginians! the Fountain-head of this mighty river of Life and Liberty is 
ours — ours to keep, ours to guard. And like " the blue-eyed boy," at the Foun- 
tain of old, I think I see the winged white horse in the heavens fast descending 
here again; and if we will but wait, and watch, and be worthy, and be bold 
to be free, ive have the bridle of magic reins and golden bit in our own hands, and 
we may mount the Pegasus to slay every Hydra and Gorgon dire, which 
threaten our peace or our fate I******** 

But the civil celebration of this day is ended ; the military are waiting for 
me, and the drum-beat calls me to the Review. I cannot longer detain you, for 
you must not forget that I am Commander-in-chief of ^f^our army, and we must 
now go to the battle-field! 

By previous arrangement, the military who took part in tlie cere- 
monies were reviewed by Gov. Wise, after the exercises at the stand 
had concluded. It was a grand and imposing display, and reflected 
great credit upon the companies that were engaged in it. The follow- 
ing named companies appeared in the line : 

1st Regiment Virginia Volunteers, commanded by Lt. Col. R. M. Cary. 
Fayette Artillery, Capt. Clopton. 
Richmond Greys, Lieut. Bossieu. 
Young Guards, Capt. Richardson. 
Montgomery Guards, Capt. Moore. 



28 CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

National Guards, Capt. Bayly. 

Virginia Rifles, Capt. Lybrock. 

Petersburg Artillery, Capt. Nichols. 

Norfolk Junior Volunteers, Capt. Robinson. 

Portsmouth Regiment, commanded by Col. D. S. Walton. 

Portsmouth Rifles, Capt. Richardson. 

National Greys, Capt. Dean. 

Marion Rifles, Capt. Hodges. 

Dismal Swamp Rangei's, Capt. Choate. 

Webster Cadets, Capt. Pliilips. 

Old Dominion Guards, Capt. Karns. 

To the above two Regiments were attached several fine bands of 
music, whose performance on the occasion elicited the admiration of all. 

At 5 o'clock, P. M. the Society returned to the Powhatan, and set 
down to an elegant and sumptuous dinner provided for the occasion. 
The late hour to which the exercises on the island had been protracted, 
deprived the Society of the company of Ex-President and Mrs, Tyler 
and their party, who were obliged to return in the Richmond boat. 
For the same reason, Governor Wise, and other invited guests, were 
unable to participate in the closing scenes of the celebration. 

The following regular toasts were drunk : 

1. The Settlement of Jamestovm — Hallowed by the privations and sufFeringe 
of the first settlers, and sanctified by recollections most deeply cherished, its 
name emblazons the brightest page of our colonial history, and opens the most 
glorious chapter in tlie history of man. 

2. John Smith — The founder of the first permanent settlement in North 
America; the pioneer of civilization; a Christian Knight; a true Hero; a de- 
voted Patriot ; and a wise Ruler. Virginia will ever honor his luemory. 

3. Pocahontas — The forest Queen of America, who stayed the up-lifted war- 
club, and saved Smith and his brave companions from savage butchery. Vir- 
ginia will ever cherish her memory with filial fondness and veneration. 

4. The memory of Washington. (Drunk standing.) 

5. The Constitution of the United States. 

6. The President of the United States. 

The following letter from the President of the United States was 
read : 

Washington, 11 th May, 18.'>'7. 
My Dear Sir : 

I have had the honor, on yesterday, to receive, by Dr. Blake, a copy of the 
Resolutions of the Jamestown Society of Washington, inviting me "to be pre- 
sent as the guest of the Society at the approaching Anniversary Celebration of 
the Settlement at Jamestown." 

I regret that pressing and important engagements will deprive me of the 
pleasure and the privilege of being with you on that deeply interesting occa- 
sion. Please to accept the will for the deed, and with many thanks, believe 
me to be, 

Yours, very respectfully, 

JAMES BUCHANAN. 

7. The State of Virginia. 

8. Ex-President Tyler — His eloquent, comprehensive, and instructive Ora- 
tion, pronounced on this day, does justice to a noble theme, and entitles him to 
the lasting gratitude of friends, wherever found, of the great cause of liberty, 
civilization, and progress. 

9. Heney a. Wise, Governor of Virginia. 



CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. ^"^ 

The following letter from Governor Wise was read : 

Washington City, April 20th, 1857. 

n Q,v ■ T hPff vou to present my acknowledgments to the Jamestown 
^ ^IZ 5 wLS<.ton CUy^or their invitation to attend their Celebration on 
?hT&Mavnevt"^^^ participate in the ceremonies 

proudest personages left, linking us to the Fathers, and I can well .a> . Hear 

^'to^Joii individually, sir, I am grateful for the manner in which jouhave 
exjre sed Xe ilivitatiJi'i of' the Soliety, and far nioi-e for being ^J^o^l^^n^l 
example of a true son of the Commonwealth of \ irginia. Be pleased 
cent mv kindest regards, and believe me, 

\onrs truly, „rTci-r. 

HENRY A. WISE. 
*,■■»*.•»•»'. 
To Philip R. Fendall, Esq., President, &c., &c. 

VOLUNTEER TOASTS. 

n R n T.vloe—Tames Barron Hope, the Poet of the Day— his beautiful 
an?L?toSc^odfprov?sTat poetry is Jot always fiction, and that the pains of 
memory may be removed by the "pleasures of hope. . t> ..-^.nf 

By Geo. T. Whittington-The memory of Thomas Ritchie, the first President 

"'rrSrfoll Brent-The President of onr Society, (P. R- ^^-^^^-^ 
pafil/i'sm a"d zeallvinced on the present occasion, deserve the warmest^grati- 
tude of all Virginians. 

Mr. Fendall addressed the company at some length. He then pro- ^ 
posed a sentiment in honor of George W. P. Cust,s, to winch the old 
man eloquent" replied in his usual happy style. 

V.V F McNerhany-Gov. Henry A. Wise, of Virginia-a gallant ^on of the 

rdat s to .iciety. (Thi. toast was e„tl„„i.st,callj received 

Rv Ool W F Phillips-The Constitution of ti.e Un.ted S'J *»»"<',"'« ^ J 
DcSi,SnJ!i,e!i s o,bS,, a,.J be ,.ec.,„ized in ..e...se« 

r rSSi J": :';:rn:U);:;h;:.e"e:.eXnp.ifte/to «.. o. 

*ByT:«IkrOur Viee President o, the Da,-,no. T. T„,ers_a To,«, 
of strength. 

Mr. Towers replied in a few remarks. 



80 CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

By H. M. Morfit — Virginia, the resting place of our ancestors, anH the home 
of our birth — niay her sons cherish a happj' remembrance of her history, and 
manifest a brotherhood among themselves wherever they meet. 

By C. W. C. Dunnington — Nathaniel Bacon and Thomas Jefferson — what the 
first originated in his rebellion, the latter perfected in his Declaration of Inde- 
pendence. 

By B. O. Tayloe — Old Virginia — like old Madeira, loses nothing by age. 

By D. H. Wood — May we ever cherish with a holy reverence the influence 
of woman. Isabella pledged her jewels to send Columbus on his voyage of dis- 
covery; Pocahontas saved the life of Smith from the tomahawk of Powhatan, 
and Mary gave to the United States our beloved Washington. 

Sent by a Lady who attended the Celebration — A daughter of Massachu- 
setts — the time honored and patriotic State which aimually assembles her chil- 
dren around the ice-bound base of Plymouth Rock, and there teaches them to 
worship at a countr3''s shrine, would here tender in the presence of this hon- 
ored company her gratitude for the privilege of assembling with them around 
the altar where Freedom and a Nation Jir.it sprang to light. 

Sent by Miss M***** — To the memory of Pocahontas, a moral heroine in 
the cause of the earliest settlers of Virginia, and the first convert from the In- 
dian tribes to civilization and Christianity. 

By Geo. T. Whittington — The Union — It may be scathed by the lightning and 
rocked to its foundation by the storm cloud of political passion, but true patri- 
otism may never despair of its perpetuity. 

By Wm. Y. Fendall — The Press — It has vindicated and borne the name and 
fame of our Republic, wherever the light of civiiizatioii has penetrated. Let 
it ever be honored as a safeguard of liberty.'// 0/tt 4 tiM4t^€, , 

By D. H. Wood — James Barron Hope, the Poet of the Day — He has invested 
the realities of histoi-y with the poetry of Romance, and entwined a wreath of 
beauty around the memories of Jamestown. 

By John Thompson — The North-Western States — They owe their existence 
to the disinterested munificence of Virginia. Is it disinterestedness that allows 
them to become enriched and strengtlieued upon the public treasure, while she 
•is taxed and crippled? 

By IL M. Morfit— The landing of the cavaliers in the New World— The De- 
claration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States; the three 
great events that have given most freedom, jDrosp.erity, and happiness to the 
family of mankind. 

Bj^W. L. Broun — The ladies of Virginia — While their faults are as small as 
their bonnets, their virtues even exceed the dimensions of their skirts. 

By Jno. T. Chance}- — the Constitution of the United States — So long as it 
shall remain unpi-ofaned, there will be no danger to the Union. 

By J. D. Wood — The Orator of the Day — The aceomplif^hed orator and states- 
man — long may he live an ornament to Virginia and to the country. 

By Virgil D. Parris, of Maine — Virginia — The star which in the darkest hour 
of the Revolution made surrounding "'darkness visible," and guided our coun- 
try to its political redeuiption. 

By Jas. W. Atkinson — The 1st Regiment Virginia Volunteers, ^iid their gal- 
lant commander, Col. Cary — Their soldier-like bearing evinces a high degree of 
military skill, and proves tliat they are fully able to maintain the gloiious motto 
of the Old Dominion, " >S'ec' iicmper Tyrannis.^' 

By C. W. C. Dunnington — Wm. Allen — The proprietor of the site of James- 
town — May the Pilgrims of 1957 meet with as hospitable a reception as we have. 

By Fendall Mai-bury — The District of Columbia — Tlie political centre of the 
Republic. 

By J. D. Smallwood — The true-li,earfed Virginia gentleman of the olden time, 
unacquainted with trade and trick-^^tne chevalier Bayard — sans penr et sans 
reproche. V-X,^ ''^i,. '^ ^ 



••^ .N VK. ^ 



!; - 



^\ 



\^C V*^->.>.>V>^ -..V^.^"^ 



CELEBKATION AT JAMESTOWN. OJ. 

mS.^ .ses-^it Etc- e;.r^ J^s/=4rSe:J 

in the hearts of their citizens. 

This toast was resi^oiuled to by Virgil D Parris, Esq, of Maine, who 
said hltwhr the ime arrived, Maine would be found sKle by side 
wth\^rji'a,in upholding the interests of the Union, and putting 
down fanaticism. 

""f/irll^o'-The Medic, f™ter„i,,y-W„i.e .e „ono. the „,».„He, 

SDonded to by Col. Harbor, of Iowa.) . , , . f„ 

Bv Wni Towers-The ancient Borough of ^^orfolk-Right glad are^e to 

ha?Ja native representative among us. (Responded to by IL M. Morfit 
\. Tohn T Towers-Virginia and Maryland, sister States-May the purit> as- 

soS^ed wl J; IZ-:J. e?er be the ehaVacteri^ics of tl-j. uiotives and acUoi^ 
By Dr. Gryraes-Yirginia and Virginians, all the world over- di.tinct as 

the billows, yet one as the sea." 

Nom-ln 1S54, the Jamestown Society wa^oi^anizj^^ 
constitution, and the election of Thomas Kitche, i [^^ f„^";,;„^pe,ording Secre- 
President; John W. Maury Treasurer; C. }^ •.^,- ^ ™^J;'"o,.,rton, E A. Ca- 

Iprfl' "it 1865, r,,iWp K. Fe.,d.U w«, elee.ed P.e.id.nt of U.e Socet.y .» 
place of Tliomas Kitcl.ie, deceased. .1 „t Mnnnt Ver 



•c 



32 CELEBRATION AT JAMESTOWN. 

ANCIENT EPITAPHS. 

The tomb stones, grey and worn with time, many broken and disi()lving into 
earth, present a rare and interesting reminiscence of foi-mer days. Old Mortality- 
like, we have deciphei'ed with tiie greatest difficulty the epitaphs upon several 
of the oldest stones, which without further introduction we commit to type: 

I. " Under this stone lies buried the body of Mrs. Hannah Ludwell, relict of 
the Honorable Philip Ludwell, Y,s([., by wliom he had one son and two daughters; 
after a most exemplary life, spent in cheerful innocence, and the constant exercise 
of piety, charitj'. and hospitality. She patiently submitted to death on the 4th 
day of April 1731, in the 42nd yv of her age." 

Near by lies the Hon Philip Ludwell, who died 11th Jan, 1720, in the 54th 
^ year of his age — for sometime auditor of his majesty's revenue. 

IL "Here Ij'eth inter'd the body of Ursula Beverly late wife of Robert 
Beverly, and daughter of ye very hon Coll Wra Byrd, who departed this life 
11th day of Octr 1798, being much lamented of all who know her, aged 16 jts 
& 2 dales." 

HI. '■^Memoriae serian. Here lyes in hope of a blessed resurrection ye bodye 
of Mrs. Sara Blair, wife of Mr. James Blair, Commissary of Virginia, and ad- 
minister of this pai'ish, most beloved daughter of Benj. & Mrs Hannah Harrison, 
of Surry — born Aug. 14 1640. Married . Died May VI, 1713, exceed- 
ingly beloved and lamented. 

IV. "H. S. E. Vir reverendus et honorabilis Jacobus Blair A. M. — Natus* * 
si. nutratus * * deinde Virginian * * terram amos LVIII * * Mar. praesi dis 
principium conciliari * * presidis coloniae praefecti munia sustinuit oruavit * * 

oris venusti decus ate hi lari sine'luxu; hospitali, munificentissimo egenis 

largo omnibus eomi. Superavit collegis * * dixeram fundaverat vivus. 
Bibliothecam suam * * olendum theologiac studiosum * * utem panperiorem 
instituendam. Testimento legavit cal. marii an. dom. MDCCXLIH. yEtat 
LXXVIH. desideratissimi senis landem nepotibus commendibunt marmore 
perenniora. 

Near by this is interred the body of the "wife of Wm. Edwards citty gent." 
The tombs of Rev. John Crouch, minister at Jamestown in 1665, several of the 
well known Travis»family of 1660 — 1720, John Champion, an old pioneer of 
1670 — 1700, and otliers, lie in the vicinity. 

The reader will be peculiarly struck 'with the following, from an old moss- 
grown slab, lying by itself, in a dicary, weedy old corner: 

V. "Here lyeth Wm. Sherwood, who was born in the parish of Whitechapel, 
near London — a great sinner waiting for a joyful resurrection." 

There is an old proverb that men's good deeds are written in marble, their 
bad ones in water. The above is an exception to the general rule. — Petersburg 
Express. 

" At St Pauf's, Bedford, Pa<«-«/,^e, wife of ■ . x- x - 

S/*«^mf/t Johnson, the mother of 24 children -^^ Nettlebed, Oxfordshire, is aa epi- 

and^ died m childbed, June 6, 1717, aged 38 taph : 

S/mdrark! Shadmch ' ^^'^ Hes Father and Mother, and Sister 

The Lord granted unto thee ' ^ ^°^ ^' . , . , 

Faticiir,',, Wee all died withm the short space of 

Who lahored long and patientl]/ one short year. 

But her pattJceSr.'.y. . a ^^^^ ^^ ^" B""^*^ ^t Wimble sxcept I. 

She departed in Zmldft'ofttir ^"^ ^ ^e buried here. 

Mut'iS. ' 

May she rest from her labors." n Tvr • ^ 4. o^ 

" At Witchingham, ob 1650 Thom«« am ^° Merideth, an organist at St. 

and his two wives. ' "''™''' "^"^^^ Mary Wilton College, Oxford. 

''Death here advantage hath of life I snvp Here lies One blown OUt of breath, 

One husband with two wives at onc'emkyi'ye.'' Who lived a merry Ufe, and died a 

"At Michael Church, Herts- Merideth. 

ifaUon"' " "'y """^''' ^"'^ J^"g^a'«i is my _ 

^°^ arrottn''"* '" ">>" S^-^ve,, and all my bones 
'''^>f;:L''/.7'"""*^'' ""^'^l^^" lam quite 



fl EPITAPH 

On Jonathan Lid, who was killed October 15.1776 near the 
Whzte Plains, on the Bronx River, N. Y. ' 

Amidst the clash of arms I came 

Here, from Holmes' Hole 

On this rude spot, unknown to fame, 

Time fixed my mortal goal. 

Twas here we met the foe, and I, 

Unluckily, was shot — 
Reeling, I heard my comrades cry. 

" Dear me ! Lid's gone to Pof\'" 



i 



